The Adventures and Misadventures of a Lost Boy
by Cubby250
Summary: The story of how a chunky kid from the present becomes one of Peter Pan's Lost Boys and the adventures and misadventures he has. Just cuz it's the 21st century doesn't mean that Neverland doesn't exist. Sort of a combo between the book & Disney movie.
1. Chapter 1

I sat on the crumbling bench and stared down at the round face topped by red hair that sprang in every direction which stared back at me from the mud puddle

I sat on the crumbling bench and stared down at the round face topped by red hair that sprang in every direction which stared back at me from the mud puddle. It was too dark to see the freckles that covered my chubby cheeks and crossed my nose. As a stiff breeze filled with rain blew through my jacket, I wondered how I'd ended up here.

My mum went away before I was old enough to remember anything about her. Went away was said in such a way that it could have meant anything from running away with a baker from Devon to having died. I had once made the mistake of asking my Father about her and found out in a violent manner that it was not a subject to be brought up. As far as I knew, my Father was the only living relative I had. There was no one else ever spoken about and no one ever came by.

My Father was a PC or police constable. He had a violent temper, loved alcohol and was sure that the world in general was against him in every way possible except for his mates on the force. He was equally sure that I was the cause of most of the problems he had, up to and including the fact he was never able to get promoted. For awhile I tried to do stuff that would make him proud of me. I figured if I could do that, maybe he'd like me and we'd become a real family or something. I slowly figured out that it didn't matter what I did, he'd always find an excuse to take his belt to me. I learned to make myself scarce when he was around and normally only ran into him on weekday mornings when I was forced to go to school.

I didn't have a whole lot of friends in school. I was 'suspect' to begin with because my Father was a copper.. Because of the verbal and physical stuff that went on, I'd never invite anyone to my flat. Add those things to the fact that I was fat and dressed funny and it wasn't hard to figure out why I was such a loner. It didn't bother me that much. In fact, there were a lot of times I preferred it just because it saved a lot of explaining. Weirdly, I did end up as someone who would give a sympathetic listen to anyone without telling what I'd heard or trying to dump all my problems on them. I'd have classmates come and tell me what was bothering them until they figured out what was going on and then they'd drift away until the next time they needed an ear. While it didn't get me a bunch of friends it also made sure no one picked on me either.

My life wasn't entirely bollixed up, though. There were a couple of places I did enjoy. One was the library. It was a massive building filled to the brim with every type of book imaginable. The council had put it up when there had been lots of money around. It had lots of cubbies and small rooms and back stairways. The money had gone and it was slowly falling apart while everyone argued what to do with it, but to me it was like the grandest castle. I love to read and spent hours in the main hall being 'someplace else'. One of the librarians noticed my interest in fantasy and used to let me know when a new title would arrive. This was the same person who paid me a couple of quid a week to come in and shift boxes of books in the basement and clean stuff up.

If the library was a castle, the basement was its throne room. It didn't look like a place where an HRH would sit, but it was full of treasure. The same people who couldn't figure out what to do with the library also weren't sure what to do with old books so they were all sent to the cavernous basement when they weren't circulated anymore. I was given the run of the place and spent many a rainy afternoon in a cross between searching for treasure and Boxing Day. The basement was a funny place, too. Whenever I was down there, I always felt like there was someone else in there or someone was watching me. Sometimes I'd see a flash of colour in the corner of my eye, but of course when I turned towards it, there was nothing to see. I guess most people would have figured it was their imagination, but I was pretty sure there was something there. The feeling was just too strong for there not to have been. Strangely enough it didn't bother me. I was pretty much a coward and something like that should have caused me to go running away, screaming. More than anything, this was a sort of reassuring thing. I mentioned it to the librarian once after worrying for about a month that if I did she'd think I was crazy and ban me for life. Instead all she did was give me a considering look and finally told me that every fey folk needed a home. It sounded promising, ,but that's all shed ever say about it. She'd always listen intently to what I thought I might have seen and my ideas on the matter but never volunteer anything else.

The second place I loved was a small wood about a mile from the flat. I had to cross a railway and make a terrifying journey through a cemetery to get to it, but it was worth it. The wood itself was impossible and shouldn't have existed. It was surrounded on all sides by industrial estates and the cemetery. I never saw anything there like litter or other such stuff to show that anyone else visited the place. Trying to zoom in on the location using Google on one of the library computers simply showed the industrial estates, even if I used the satellite image thing. I can't remember how I found the place and never told anyone about it because I was afraid that if I did, it would 'break' and I'd never find it again. The wood itself had to have been only a couple of acres, but I had spent whole days exploring it. There were trees perfect for climbing, a creek that ran through it which bubbled up from a spring and disappeared at the other end down a culvert, and a small pool that was always the perfect temperature and just big enough to float in and watch the clouds chase each other in the sky above. Every time I wandered there, there was always something new I discovered. Things as simple as a bird's nest to a cave that I swore hadn't been there the last time I visited. Sometimes I got the same feeling in the wood as I did in the library, but with a couple of differences. In the basement there was always the feeling of being watched, but in the wood there were times I knew I was all alone. Other times I felt the same reassuring type thing that I did in the library basement. A few times, though, there was something in the wood that terrified me to the point of panic. The first time I felt it, I vowed I would never go back. That resolution lasted less than two days and had me feeling miserable by the end of the first day. Since that time, whenever I felt it, I would just leave as quickly as I could while trying not to cry like a baby from being so scared.

The library and the wood helped me survive my life. They let me know that things might not have been as hopeless as they could have been and gave me something to look forward to both during the day when it seemed like the drone of the teacher was beyond bearing to the wee hours of the morning when I cowered on the floor huddled in a blanket wondering if I was going to get a thrashing for some imagined ill I had done. Then came the day I turned twelve.

Birthdays were definitely things I didn't celebrate for many reasons. I suffered through school on the day of my twelfth and then headed to the library. I spent most of the afternoon exploring the basement and reading a book on the pirates of the Spanish Main. The book tried to make it sound like the buccaneers led grand adventures and lived a life to be envious of. It seemed to gloss over the killings, looting and destruction they brought upon others. It was an interesting book in its way, but I had an irrational hatred of pirates. Not that one had to worry about any except those that copied movies and software in 21st century Britain.

Around 18.00 when it was almost time to leave, the librarian called me to her desk and presented me with a wrapped package. She wished me a 'happy birthday' which surprised me because I couldn't ever remember having mentioned that it was my birthday. She watched as I opened the parcel to reveal a copy of _Peter Pan_. The copy was in horrible condition with pages taped into it, a stained cover, and penciled notations throughout. I loved it because I could imagine the number of people who had read that copy.

"How'd you know I liked _Peter Pan_?" I asked her. "It's like my favourite book. This is so awesome. Thank you."

She gave me one of her intense looks, her blue eyes freezing me to the spot as she stared at me. "I've known a few boys who liked the story. And a story is just what it is, isn't it?" She continued to stare at me as if my answer were the most important thing she'd hear that day.

I thought about the question before answering. To me the answer was obvious, but it was a certainty that didn't seem to extend to very many other people. "It's a wonderful story about the most magical place ever," I finally ventured.

"So you believe in Neverland, do you?"

"Yes," I answered slowly. She continued staring at me, but it didn't have any mocking in it like I'd expect from most grown-ups. Feeling uncommonly brave I continued in a rush. "Every night when it's not cloudy, I look out my window to see if I can see the second star to the right and wish on it that I could somehow end up there. I even leave the window open half the time just… you know, in case Peter Pan might for some reason kind of decide that maybe he might kind of end up in Bradfordshire one night." I felt my face go hot as I confessed something I'd never ever told anyone before. I waited for the laughter I dared hope wouldn't come and was grateful when it didn't.

"Neverland might not be the way it is in the movies, you know. I would doubt that good always triumphs over pirates and there might be a few things of the fey variety that Sir Barrie didn't feel the need to put in his memoir even if he did know of them. You might find life in Britain a lot more comfortable than life in Neverland if that wish ever came true."

"Yeah, right," I said with a rueful laugh. "There's no way anyplace could be worse than some of the stuff I go through here. Well, not all of it. I love this place and you're really cool, but you know what I mean."

She nodded agreement in a solemn manner. There was still no hint of amusement on her face about this conversation and I was sure beyond a doubt that this was a completely serious conversation on both our parts. She opened her mouth as if to say something and then closed it and nodded once again and turned to her desk to lock some stuff up. I finished tidying up and in a few minutes we were both standing by the main door. She reached into the pocket of her coat and took out a couple of pound coins and dropped them in my hand. "Thanks. I've almost got enough now." I dropped the coins in my pocket. "For?" she asked. "I'm saving to get enough together so I can take the train to London and go to Kensington Gardens to see the Peter Pan statue. Maybe…"

"A fine undertaking," she said as we walked through the door and she locked it. "I wish you luck on your quest." I was a little disappointed because I was hoping she'd say more about Neverland. Instead she gave me a curt nod, bid me good evening and started walking down the high street. I turned to head for home when she called my name. "I think it would be for the best if you kept that book within grasp for the day," she nodded towards the copy of _Peter Pan_ that I had clutched in my arm. "You never know when such a tome will become something you need." Before I asked what she meant, she disappeared in a crowd of walkers on the sidewalk.

I slowly wended my way home, leafing through my treasure and trying to avoid running into other pedestrians. When I finally got to the council estate, I took a careful look around. The immunity from bullying I'd somehow managed to get at school didn't extend here and I knew if I were caught by any of the older kids who hung out, the book would be the first thing destroyed. Surprisingly there wasn't a single soul on the playground or the sidewalks and I was able to walk to the flat without using one of the seemingly millions of detours I'd developed to get around trouble.

I guess it was the excitement of having the book to read, the fact that the day had gone pretty decently, the lack of having to be careful on my way home, and the rain that started falling heavily that got me in trouble. Normally I would have waited outside the door and listen to try and figure out if Father was home and if so, what sort of mood he was in. Aside from making sure that Peter Pan wasn't locked out in case he ever wandered by for a visit, I also left my window unlocked because there was more than one occasion I had climbed through it when using the front door wasn't recommended. 'Out of sight, out of mind' was much more than a cliché when it came to my Father. Tonight, I was beginning to get soaked and was worried about the book so I simply walked in without thinking about what might happen.

"And were might you have been?" a voice thundered as I closed the door. I thought about turning around and walking out, but he must have seen it because he crossed the room in a couple of strides, grabbed me by the arm, and pulled me farther inside. When he didn't say anything, but simply stood there looking at me and breathing heavily, I knew it was going to be bad. Very bad. "I asked you a question and I be damned expect an answer. Where have ye been?" This time he didn't yell or rage, but asked it in a very quiet voice that scared me almost as much as the thing in the wood.

"I was just out trying to do some odd jobs to make some to help out." He knew that I earned some money doing chores and things. He'd actually found the money I'd saved up and threatened to beat me if he ever found out that I had money I wasn't giving him. I held out the two quid. "H-Here," I quavered.

He struck my hand holding the coins with his other hand, causing them to fall to the floor. "Ya fat pig. I know ya been holding out on me. Probably got all sorts of coin grubbed away, don't ya? Well, there'll be a reckoning of that this evening along with everything else. Ya been getting away with too much of late and I intend to break you of it. And the very first thing you're going to tell me is where it is?"

"Where what is?" It seemed like the whole flat reeked of alcohol and I thought I was going to be sick from both that and fear. I'd only seen him like this once before and had the scar to remind myself of it.

"Don't hand me that. You know what 'it' is." He let go of the grip on my arm that would probably show purple tomorrow where he'd grabbed me. He started to undo his belt. It had a very large, very heavy buckle. "You tell me right now what you did with it or you'll be sorry you were ever born."

I perversely came close to saying that he was too late to cause that, but some wise thing inside forced me to hold my tongue. Instead I backed away a little. "I don't know what you mean. If you tell me, maybe I can look for it." The instant I said it, I knew I'd screwed up big time. Offering to look for it meant that I was implying he'd lost it. I backed away a little more, but he caught the movement this time.

"Don't you back away from me you big bloody coward." He pulled his belt off and lunged for me. I was lucky that he wasn't real steady on his feet. I'm pretty clumsy and normally he'd have been able to grab me. This time I managed to stay on my feet and he missed, falling against a couch. I ran to the door and fumbled with the knob trying to get it open as he regained his feet and came after me. I could hear him get closer, but in my panic I had managed to lock the door which hadn't been locked to begin with. I threw the bolt again, tore the door open and ran out. I wasn't quite fast enough. As my feet cleared the stoop, he must have swung the belt at me. There was an intense pain in the back of my head and stars exploded across my eyes. I fell over the bin skinning both my palms and my knees, but somehow managing to keep hold of my book. I crawled as fast as I could before regaining my feet and breaking into a stumbling run, almost overcorrecting and ending up on my face. Behind me I heard my Father screaming to the night that he'd kill me when I came back.

I ran through the estate trying to put as much distance between me and my Father as I could. I was pretty sure he wouldn't follow me, but I wasn't willing to bet on it. There was a group of older kids on the sidewalk in front of me, but I must have looked awful because they backed off giving me plenty of room to pass. I didn't pay any attention to where I was headed, but when I tripped over a metal rail, I figured my feet had decided to take me to the wood. I'd never been there at night and added the fear that the terror thing would be there to the other things I was currently worrying about. I slowly got up and started walking towards the cemetery. The rain was still pouring down and I was panting from the unaccustomed exercise and didn't hear the train until it thundered down the track behind me causing me to start running in fear again until I came to the low wall of the graveyard.

I almost lost my nerve there. The graveyard was a scary place during the full light of day. Most of the markers and gravestones were crumbling and stood at weird angles. The whole place was overgrown with grass and weeds. The place was broken up with trees whose limbs looked like the arms of monsters and never sprouted leaves, even in the middle of summer. They were not friendly trees and I always had the feeling if I ever tried to climb one the branches would slowly tear me apart. I stood there trying to peer through the darkness, but couldn't see anything except the wall in front of me. I think it was finally the train that forced me to go on. It continued thundering behind me and I had the sudden thought that it would never end and I'd always be stuck on this patch of land between the train and the graveyard wall if I didn't move.

I climbed to the top of the wall. It was made of rough stone and was only about thigh high on me. I stood on the top of it and looked down to the other side, but still couldn't see a thing. Finally I jumped knowing that there wouldn't be any ground on the other side and I'd fall forever. It didn't work out that way and I bit my tongue as my feet jarred on the ground. The rain didn't seem as loud on this side of the wall, which made no sense. My eyes must have gotten used to the darkness because I could see a little bit, but by no means clearly. Behind me the train finally ended and the night grew silent except for the rain and wind. Every fantasy tale I'd ever read where the hero entered crypt or graveyard and the horrible things that normally occurred came back to me in full detail. I stood there trying to decide if it would be better to run across as fast as I could to cross as quickly as possible and possibly break my neck by tripping over a marker or falling into a grave that the departed had left open when they had escaped as a zombie, or if it would be better to move slowly so I wouldn't be noticed even though it would take longer and give the trees a chance to sneak up behind me and play catch with my head after they tore it off my body. I decided on the latter and slowly made my way across the graveyard.

After forever, I finally reached the wall on the other side. I'd walked so slowly that both my legs had gotten cramps and somewhere in the town center I'd heard the clock toll the hour a few times. I climbed over the wall and looked at the wood and came close to breaking into tears. Instead of the wood, there was a street backed by warehouses and factories. Across from where I stood was a dilapidated bench with a bus stop sign. The wood was gone. I finally crossed the street and sat on the bench and cried.

I looked up from the puddle and felt the back of my head again. It was still throbbing and whenever I felt back there, my fingers came back all reddish. The book I still held must be ruined by now. There were red fingerprints on the cover and I was sure that it must be soaked inside. The wood was gone and I couldn't ever go back to the library because _they_ would be looking for me. I wasn't quite sure who they were except for the fact I was sure they were all mates of my Father from the police force who would have been told to find me and do something with me. The more I thought about that, the more I became convinced that the best revenge would be for me to do something first. I'd kill myself and cheat 'they' out of the satisfaction of doing it. I slowly got up from the bench, staggering as my legs protested and a wave of dizziness washed over me. I crossed the street again and managed to climb over the stone wall. I took one last look behind me to make sure the wood hadn't appeared, but the street and warehouses stubbornly remained.

I don't remember a lot about crossing the graveyard the second time. I wasn't as concerned about man-eating trees or zombies or even vampires or mummies this time. I came to the other wall, climbed over it and started walking towards the tracks. I didn't know when the next train would be by, but figured it probably wouldn't be too long. I sat down next to the track instead of on it because for some reason it was real important that I not get run down by a train if I fell asleep. I'd wait here until I heard one and then move to the track.

At first I thought the green was from a tree, even though it was midwinter and none of the trees had any leaves on them. It took me a moment to figure out that what I was seeing was a figure dressed in green tunic, pants and some sort of shoes wearing a green hat with a bright red feather in it. That in itself would have been a bit unusual, but this person was sitting about two feet above me in midair and playing some sort of pipes. Even odder was that although it was the dead of night, I could see him clearly enough to see that he had pointed ears and was completely dry even though it was still pouring. For a second I wondered if I had accidentally fallen on the track in front of a train.

"Naw, you ain't dead," the figure said, taking the pipes from his mouth. "So you really want to kill yourself, huh?" I nodded wondering who this person was. He had a high pitched voice and looked as though he was slightly taller than me, although it was hard to tell with him 'sitting'. He was also a lot skinnier than I was and it hair was redder. He had a smile on his face that could have been mischievous, mean or friendly. His face was mostly in shadow, which made no sense at all, and a sort of very subtle, very dim reddish light seemed to glow behind his eyes. "Good thing you're here then. The express from Liverpool will be by at exactly midnight. You've only got twenty minutes to wait."

"Who are you?" I asked in a whisper. Something in my mind had suddenly clicked and part of my mind knew exactly who this elven figure was while another part of me went around clucking that I'd gone insane.

"Who am I?" he asked in surprise. "Why you know who I am. Every Lost Boy knows who I am. At least they'd better."

"But that's impossible," I whispered, more to myself than to the figure floating above me. "Isn't it?"

"Anything's possible with faith, trust and pixie dust. Of course you don't _have_ to believe. You only have to wait eighteen minutes for the train and then you won't have to believe in anything." He started playing the pipes again, the song strange and mournful as it smothered the sound of the falling rain. "But you better decide soon."

"Decide what?" I was confused about everything and wondered how much of this was because my head was throbbing. There was a very large part of my muddled mind that was absolutely certain beyond doubt that the person floating in front of me was my hero. A tiny part of me was busy shouting as loud as it could that there was no way it was Peter Pan. Strangely enough it wasn't screaming it because it didn't believe, but because it simply wouldn't accept that Pan would be concerned about a fat kid in Bradfordshire no matter how much he wished upon stars.

"Why if you're going to be a Lost Boy of course." He gave me a suspicious look. "You do believe in Neverland, don't you?"

I got off the ground and walked over to where he was floating. "You mean me? You'd make me a Lost Boy? I can go to Neverland and meet the rest of the Lost Boys and go on adventures and see mermaids and Indians and, and…" I stopped, overwhelmed by the possibilities. I was so excited I started trembling."

"Oh sure," he said as if we were discussing a trip to Leeds. "You can be the lostest Lost Boy I bet. But ya gotta follow orders." The reddish light behind his eyes got just a tiny bit brighter and the smile on his face became sly. "Can you do that?"

I nodded my head up and down like an idiot. "Yeah. I can do that. I can do whatever you want. Promise. I can. I really will." I was beginning to babble.

"Are you sure?" he said, sounding unconvinced. "You'd have to fight pirates."

"I can do that."

"And wild animals."

"I can do that too."

"And maybe dragons."

"I can… Dragons? There aren't any dragons in Neverland. Uh, are there?"

"There are lots of things in Neverland. Dragons and elves and dwarves and mermaids. Good stuff and bad stuff. It's not all in the book, you know." He pointed to the book sitting on the ground where I left it. "And everyone there knows of Peter Pan." He rose into the air and crowed so loudly that I could hear the echo. That's what convinced the rest of me that it was truly Peter who was in front of me.

"I don't care," I said. "I'll fight anything if you take me to Neverland." I was beginning to plead and beg but didn't care. "Please take me with you. I'll do anything. I'll.. I'll even fight a dragon if you want."

The reddish light intensified a bit more as his expression became deadly serious. "If you make a promise like that you can never back out. You _have_ to do it."

"I will, I promise."

The serious look turned mischievous for a moment. "Welllll… I dunno. You're pretty fat for a Lost Boy and you look really clumsy."

"But…" If there had been a train on the track at that moment, I'd have thrown myself in front of it.

"You don't look to brave either. Are you brave?"

I swallowed as disappointment started to flood me. There had never been any mention of qualifications to become a Lost Boy in any of the books or movies, just the possibility of having fallen out of a pram and not having anyone look for you. "No," I muttered quietly.

"Craven too." He shook his head as though that was the final straw. The mischievous look switched in an instant back to the deadly serious one. "Swear?" he asked.

Not knowing what else to do and having read it in what seemed like dozens of fantasy novels, I dropped down to one knew, bowed my head and said, "I swear." For an instant the rain stopped falling and the wind died. The world became deadly silent except for a small chiming sound after which the sounds of the night seemed to come crashing back to fill the void.

"Pretty posh, that. Now we have to get you to Neverland."

"Do I get to fly? With pixie dust and happy thoughts?"

"How else do you think you're going to get there?" He took a look around and pointed to a signal box that sat next to the railway line. "Climb up on top of that."

I walked over to the box that stood about as tall as I did. After a lot of slipping and false starts I managed to clumsily climb to the top of it and stood up. The top was slick and sloped so I had a hard time keeping my balance. Pan flew up next to me and nodded his approval. "Now for pixie dust."

"You mean Tinkerbell is here?" I asked excitedly, trying to look in all directions at once and almost losing my balance and tumbling off the box.

"Course not. She hates the rain. You sure don't know much, do you?" I was too excited to be upset by the rebuke and watched while he reached into his tunic and brought out a small bag. He reached in, took a pinch of something out of it and dropped it over my hair. There was a faint tingling feeling and the throb in my head got worse. "Now think of a happy thought and jump."

"You mean jump off the box?" I knew it was a dumb question, but I was scared to death of doing something wrong and ruining everything. He simply shook his head at my question and gestured for me to hurry up.

"You don't have to flap your arms, you're not a bird," he said in mild exasperation as I began flapping. "Just jump."

I closed my eyes, held my nose and thought of being a Lost Boy as I jumped as high as I could off the box. I was airborne! I opened my eyes and started yelling in excitement before I bellyflopped onto the ground, knocking the wind out of me and sending up a cascade of muddy water which covered me as it fell back to the ground.

"That's not right," Pan commented in all seriousness after he finished laughing. "Did you think of a happy thought? Sometimes it's hard for Lost Boys to come up with happy thoughts when they first become Lost Boys." I was a little surprised at the sadness that echoed from his voice when he said that. I assured him that I had a happy thought in mind. "Well something's wrong." He sounded vexed, but not at me. "What can the problem be?" I slowly climbed to my feet, muddy water streaming from my hair down my face. I tried wiping the mud off my clothes, but only succeeded in smearing it more. He stood there floating above me, deep in thought as he looked at me. "Wait a second, I bet I know." He drifted over to where I was standing and with his foot poked me in my stomach before laughing. "That's it. Climb back onto the box."

It took me longer to get up this time because of my mud covered hands. He told me that I'd better hurry because it was almost midnight and there was no turning back if midnight came and went and I wasn't flying yet. Once again I managed to get to the top of the box, although this time I stood in a crouch because I was afraid if I stood up all the way, I'd topple off. "I bet you're as heavy as Cubby was. It always took a lot of pixie dust to get him off the ground."

"Cubby?"

"Yeah. You look just like him. Red hair, goofy expression, clumsy," he took the bag of pixie dust and upended it over my head and moved a few feet away, "and heavy." This time the tingling sensation went from my head to my toes and the back of my head stopped throbbing. "Okay, jump." I stood there frozen, afraid that if I jumped I'd end up face first in the mud again. Somewhere there was the shriek of a train whistle. "C'mon, jump. You have to. You promised you'd obey my orders, remember?" I tried to jump, but my feet remained stubbornly rooted to the box. "Think happy thoughts," Peter said as he flew to where I was standing and shoved me in the back. I went flying several feet and… was floating.

"I'm flying, I'm flying!" I shouted to the sky. "Look at me, I'm flying." Next to me the train thundered down the track and I wondered if anyone was glancing out a window and seeing the newest Lost Boy floating next to the train before it vanished into the night. I moved my arms and legs as though I was swimming and discovered it didn't take much to move pretty quickly. "Peter, look. I'm flying, I'm really flying." I turned back to look at him and saw he had an indulgent grin on his face. I turned my head back just in time to run face first into a bunch of tree branches.

Peter gave me a few minutes to get some practice in before deciding it was time to head for Neverland. I still had a few problems, but thought I was doing okay. He led me south towards where London lay. "Wait a second," I suddenly yelled. "I forgot something. I need the book."

"Don't worry about it," Peter said unconcernedly. "It's not there anymore. It's gone where it needs to be."

"What do you mean?" I asked as we floated above sleeping villages and meadows.

He shrugged. "Wherever it has to be, there's where it is."

"You mean it's what led you to me or something like that?" He refused to answer but simply said that it was where it needed to be. I asked a few more times, but he ignored my questions until finally saying, "You sure do ask a lot of questions, Cubby."

"Cubby? Is that my Lost Boy name? Cubby?"

"Sure. You look just like him. Or was that Curly? Either way. You're Cubby." He did a couple of barrel rolls and sped up with me tagging behind him. I thought about being named Cubby and couldn't stop grinning. I thought it was perfect.


	2. Chapter 2

The island looked a lot bigger than I thought it would, but wasn't huge

The island looked a lot bigger than I thought it would, but wasn't huge. There were mountains in the middle of it that were snowcapped, surrounded by hills covered in green. On the north side of the island was a forest that looked ancient and dark, even from as high as we were. The south side was covered with the type of forest I was more familiar with and not nearly as old or shaggy looking as that of the north. Beach surrounded most of the island except for a portion where cliffs rose high above the sea that crashed angrily against the rocks. There were a ton of lagoons, inlets and cays big and small. In one of them there was a ship with sails and a skull-and-crossbones flying from the mast. I was pretty sure I knew who that belonged to. I also saw rivers and lakes and the possibility of other things hidden by the woods. "Do Lost Boys really live in Hangman's Tree?"

"Under it and in it. You can't see it from here, but you'll find out where it is later. But you can never tell anyone because you never know when the pirates might be listening." He pointed to a beach down below. "That's where we're going to land, okay?" I nodded, happy that I was finally going to be on solid ground again. He gave me a mischievous grin and then flew on ahead. I heard him crow a couple of times before he touched down on the beach. As he landed I saw figures appear to join him, all of them looking up at me. Normally I'd have been scared about meeting other people, but that was pushed back by the realization I had no idea how to land.

I could slow down a little, but not nearly enough to land. I watched as the beach came at me faster and faster. As I flashed by where the waves were gently breaking, I had the idea that I might be able to start running as fast as I could and sort of go from flying to running in one step. It didn't work out that way at all. I ended up taking two huge giant steps before my body passed my legs and I fell face first towards the sand. Suddenly there was sand in my nose and mouth and stinging my eyes. Even lying on the ground, I was still moving through the sand really fast and causing it to spray all over. Through the cloud of sand, I noticed a tree trunk right in front of me. Not knowing what else to do, I put my hands out in front of me and closed my eyes and hoped that it might suddenly vanish or something. My hands passed on either side of the trunk and I came to a sudden stop when my head hit the tree. There was a brilliant bright light behind my eyelids and I saw millions of stars. Before I could figure out what that was all about, everything went black.

I woke up to feel someone poking around the top of my head. I let out a bellow as the hand made contact with a bump. "I guess that means it hurts," a voice said. I had ended up on my back. I slowly opened my eyes to see a person looking down at me with a serious expression on his face. He had what looked like a mouse hood over his head, with blonde hair spilling out beneath it. "You okay?" he asked.

"I guess so. My head hurts."

"I don't doubt it, mate. Still, you must have one thick skull. Wait 'til you see what you did to the poor tree." He probed my head for a few more seconds, looked at my eyes to make sure they weren't crossed or too big or small or whatever he was looking for. "No worries, don't look like you fractured your skull or anything. C'mon, lets get you up." He stood up, reached down and grabbed my arm. For a second I was afraid that he wasn't going to be able to move me and would laugh at me or something but he was a lot stronger than he looked. Without seeming to strain at all, he hauled me to my feet. I discovered it wasn't a mouse hood he was wearing, but that he was dressed in a kangaroo pelt.

"Who are you? Are you a Lost Boy?" I shook my head a little which turned out to be a very bad idea. "What happened, anyway?"

He gave a twisted grin. "I'm Roo and, yeah, I'm a Lost Boy. What happened was that Peter didn't bother to tell you how to land before you got to the island. He does that to everyone. It's sort of an initiation thing with him."

"But ain't no one ever managed to make a trench that deep," I heard someone else say, and then laugh. I turned around to see five other boys standing behind me. Two were dressed in raccoon pelts, and the remaining three were in fox, lion, and tiger pelts. I didn't see any sign of Peter around. I gave a tentative grin which was returned by a couple of them.

Roo walked to where the other boys were and started introducing them. "This is Stumble," he said pointing to one of the raccoon pelted boys.

"Oh, yeah. You make stew, right?"

"What's that supposed to mean? You don't like it or something?"

Roo rolled his eyes. "He hasn't even had any of it yet. How would he know if he liked it or not." Stumble considered that and finally nodded. Stumble was a little shorter than I was and had black hair. "This is Surefoot. He's one of our trackers," Roo continued, pointing to the other raccoon pelted boy. They obviously weren't twins as Surefoot was shorter than Stumble and had brownish hair. He had a self-assured expression on his face and gave me a grin as Roo introduced him. The boy in the fox pelt was introduced as Red, although he had dirty blonde hair. He was taller than me and had a face that looked like it was always ready to break out into a grin. "You gotta watch him," Roo said. "He's big on practical jokes and things like that."

The last introductions were Tigger, in the tiger pelt and Leo, in the lion pelt. They were twins, a little taller than me, both with sandy brown hair. The tiger pelted boy wore a look of pure joy and stood as though any moment he might take off running somewhere. The lion pelted boy looked as solemn as his brother looked mischievous. He had a worried look on his face and kept glancing over at Tigger as though he was afraid he might actually bolt off or something. "Leo and Tigger are… I guess you could say they're sort of like rangers. Tigger ain't scared of nothing, least nothing that he'll admit to. The only thing Leo is scared about is that Tigger might get into something he can't handle. You already know my name. I was a sea scout… before and cuz of that I know a lot of first aid and stuff like that. So if ya get shot with an arrow or something come see me."

I looked at the boys as curiously as they were looking at me. They seemed kind of friendly and I wasn't nearly as nervous as I usually was when I met new people. At the same time I wondered if I was ever going to fit in with them. All of them looked pretty self-assured. They all knew each other and knew where they fit in and stuff like that. I was just the new kid who didn't have a clue. Would they be as friendly after I'd messed up a few times? That train of thought vanished for a moment as I was nudged by the kid in the fox pelt and I realized he'd asked me a question. "Huh?" I said, embarrassed because I'd been caught wool-gathering. "Sorry, I was thinking about…" I gestured with an arm to encompass everything around.

He grinned. "Looks like we got another dreamer. Haven't had one since Cloudy. So what's your name?"

I started to give my 'real' world name and then stopped. I'd left that behind now and was glad of it. "Cubby," I blurted out. "Peter said I was going to be called Cubby."

"Cubby? I thought there'd already been a Cubby." Red turned to look at Stumble who nodded. "There's some sort of weird story about the first one," Red muttered more to himself, than to me. He kind of shrugged his skinny shoulders and then grinned again. "One thing's for sure. You're the right size and shape to be a Cubby."

I felt a stab of pain. I'd figured if there was one group who wouldn't care about how big I was it'd be these guys. Before I could drop too deeply in gloom, I looked at Red again. The grin he was giving me wasn't mocking or mean-spirited. It was a friendly one that had me grinning back at him before I realized it. "Yeah, I sort of look like a bear I guess." I could feel myself blushing. It wasn't a major comment about my weight, but it was the first time I'd ever sort of commented on it this way. Even though I didn't think he would, I wondered what I'd do if he started making a bunch of comments about it or something.

"Hey Roo. Can I show Cubby around?"

"Knock yourself out." He gave me an appraising look. "Use the trapdoor on the left. It should work until Peter fixes it for him. Oh, and be sure to warn him what he's in for this evening." I watched in bemusement as the group of Lost Boys vanished as quickly as they'd appeared.

"Where are they going?"

"We were playing 'King of the Hill' when you showed up and they're going to go finish it. I'd gotten caught in the green dungeon level, so I was already out anyway. You look like you'd be pretty good at it though."

I wondered what type of 'King of the Hill' they played here. I'd never played it before, but thought all it involved was just a bunch of people on a hill trying to push each other down. I didn't know anything about dungeon levels or stuff like that. I timidly followed Red as he plowed through some underbrush at the edge of the beach. On the other side of the brush we entered a forest. The temperature was a lot cooler under the trees and felt really good. There was a hint of breeze as the leaves above rustled. "What'd he mean about fixing a trapdoor for me?" The thought of using a trapdoor made me a little nervous, but not nearly as much as the fact that it might have to be fixed for some reason. All sorts of thoughts ran through my mind as to what could possibly need to be fixed.

"All of us have our own trapdoor into Hangman's Tree," Red explained as we started down a rocky path that looked more like it was a dry stream bed than anything else. "Cuz we each have our own, it has to fit us perfectly. Otherwise you'll go down too fast and splat when you get to the end or you'll get stuck in the middle. You can survive a splat but you definitely don't want to get stuck when you go through your trapdoor."

"How come?" Just being stuck would be enough for me, but he'd given me a look and shuddered when he'd said it as though there was some horror beyond simply being stuck.

Red looked around and lowered his voice as if someone would be eavesdropping on him in the middle of the forest. His voice was full of menace as he began talking. "There used to be a Lost Boy named Fuzzle. _He_ got stuck going into his trapdoor one day. Most of us were too big to fit in his trapdoor, so only a couple were able to get in and try to push or pull him out. But no one could budge him at all. He was stuck fast. That night all we could hear was him howling because he couldn't get out. It was so loud that the wolves in the hills howled back at him. It was horrible."

"So what happened? Did he finally get out?"

"Oh, yeah." Red stopped, turned to me and moved a finger across his throat and then started walking again.

"He died?" I asked, horrified.

"Naturally. Peter didn't have any choice but to cut him apart. It was awful. Blood dripped down from Fuzzle's trapdoor for a week onto the common room floor. There's still red spots where it wouldn't come up. The screams were so bad that none of us could go into the Tree. We was really afraid that the pirates were going to hear and find us."

I looked over at Red in disbelief. I had sort of figured from what I'd read and what Peter had told me on the trip to the island that being a Lost Boy wasn't all fun and games. Still, I couldn't believe that Peter would actually kill one who simply got stuck in their trapdoor by accident. "You're kidding."

"Yup. You caught me." Red's laugh was so loud that it echoed through the forest and startled two green and purple birds who sped away with a sort of crowing sound. I gave a weak laugh back. "Naw, Peter'd never do that. You'd just have to starve for a few days until you could pop on out. Course that's sort of what all of us do already. Peter tell you about the stew?" I nodded. "Nuff said, then."

"Where is Peter, anyway?" I realized that I hadn't seen him since I'd introduced my head to the tree back at the beach.

"He's around. He doesn't always hang around the Tree. He has a lot of important stuff he needs to do he says. Sometimes he'll be gone…" he stopped and grabbed my arm as I stumbled on something in the streambed path. "You okay?"

"Yeah. I guess I just tripped on something."

Red took a careful look at the streambed and finally shook his head when he didn't find anything. "Anyway, sometimes Pan'll be gone for a long time. Other times he may be gone for a day or two. There ain't really any way of knowing 'til he shows up or vanishes." Red pointed to a tiny path that led off the stream trail. "This way."

I followed him onto the trail that was so narrow I had to turn sideways sometimes to get between the trees. At times id didn't even seem like there was any path at all. "How long you been a Lost Boy?" I asked as he stood and waited for me to negotiate my way through a bramble bush.

He shook his head in a not unfriendly way. "That's sort of like a 'before' question. Did Pan tell you about those?"

"Yeah, but I didn't know that would be considered one of them." I yelped and started sucking on the palm that had landed squarely on a patch of tiny thorns.

"That's okay. It doesn't really matter anyway. Sometimes time can be sort of screwy here. There are days that seem to last forever and other times they'll seem to only be a couple of hours long. Peter says if you were here a year it might be a day in the 'real' world or it might be a bunch of years." He scratched his jaw. "There's kind of like yesterday and today because tomorrow might take forever to get here or might be here in a few minutes."

I could almost understand what he meant, but before I could say anything I managed to trip on what could only have been a leaf and sprawled out on the ground. Red stopped and with a lot of fake grunting helped me to my feet. This time I looked around, but didn't see anything I could have tripped over. "Your feet," Red said.

"Huh?"

"You were looking for what you tripped over. I think it was your own two feet." I blushed and resolved that I'd try to be less clumsy as we continued along the path. The woods thickened a little, but other than that, the area we were going through didn't appear to be special or anything. I tried to see through the brush and foliage that lined either side of the trail to see if I could see any elves or dwarves or even a unicorn or two. All I saw were tons of birds and possibly a bunch of deer that barked warnings to each other before taking off deeper into the forest.

In the next few minutes, though, I followed Red through a complicated network of trail branchings and forks. By the time we finished, I was beginning to feel dizzy from the constant route changing. "What's wrong?" Red asked when he noticed how perplexed I looked.

"It's impossible. I'm never going to learn how to go from the beach to the Tree. How long'd it take you to figure out the route."

"Ooooooh, that. You don't have to worry about that. Once you've been to the Tree once, you'll always know how to find it. Sometimes things might change on the island but you'll always know how to get back home. You just can't think about it too hard. You sort of walk and you'll end up where you need to be whether it be Hangman's Tree ro someplace else."

The 'someplace else' part sounded exciting and I wondered what sort of 'someplaces' they might be and how it was known you needed to go there. I couldn't ask because I had stopped talking. The path we were now on was going up a pretty big hill and I couldn't talk and gasp for breath at the same time. As we neared the top, I got slower and slower until it felt like I was making any headway. We finally reached the top and I bent over with my hands on my knees and panted for several moments trying to catch my breath. I snuck a glance over at Red, wondering what he'd think of a so-called Lost Boy who could barely make it up a hill. Red didn't seem at all concerned about it and collapsed to the ground where he sat against a tree. He caught me looking and flashed a grin. "I hate coming up that hill." He didn't look at all winded, but I wasn't going to argue with him. I found a tree near his and sat down with my back to it.

"Am I going to get an animal pelt?" I asked after my breath began to sound abnormally normal again.

"Sure. You're not even going to have to wait for it. It'll be there when we get to Hangman's Tree. Cubby's a bear name so you'll be getting a bear pelt. I guess it could be a wolf name, but you're a little bit bigger than a wolf. It's sorta weird that your name's going to be Cubby. There used to be a Cubby."

I sort of liked the idea of being a bear. A wolf would have been cool too, but a bear probably fit me more. "Someone once told me my forearms looked like a bear's, only mine were freckle-y. What happened to the other Cubby?"

Red looked as though he was chewing on the inside of his cheek. He sat there and finally shrugged. "I dunno. He was supposed to be a hero or something but I don't know the story or anything like that. He was fat like you and had red hair and blue eyes and was kind of clumsy. You should ask Stumble. He knows more about the stuff that happened before than anyone else does."

"Does Peter know?"

"Naw, probably not. There's something you have to remember about Peter. He doesn't remember stuff that happened a long time ago. Leastways that's what he says. He's sorta cares more about what's happening now or getting ready to happen. If he forgets who you are sometimes, ya just gotta remind him that you're a Lost Boy named Cubby. He forgets who Roo is sometimes, and he's been here longer than anyone else." He threw his arms out in a huge stretch, and then stood up and stretched again. "We better get going."

I started to stand up and felt a sharp pain on my head. I tried it again with the same result. It felt almost as if something was pulling my hair and preventing me from getting up. "Red. Something's wrong. It feels like someone's grabbing my hair."

He came over to where I was sitting with a frown. After a moment I heard him chuckling. "Hang on a second, I gotta do something." I saw him grab his dagger, but couldn't tell what he was doing with it. "Try now."

I stood up without any problem at all. "What happened?" I asked as I turned to look at the tree. There was a huge hank of reddish hair where my head had been leading on the tree. I looked like it was covered with pine sap.

"Your hair got stuck to the tree. It seems to happen a lot for some reason. Your hair looks a little funny but no one will notice when you're wearing the hood of your pelt." I put my hands back there to feel what had happened, but all I could tell was that it felt like a huge tangled up mess. I'd never worried a whole lot about how my hair looked, so I ignored it.

Thankfully the next part of the trip was downhill. Red laughed when I managed to stumble a couple more times on what seemed to be absolutely nothing. He made a comment about the fact that it appeared I was pretty clumsy, but tempered it by noting that I was probably tired and that is seemed like all new Lost Boys were clumsy when they first arrived. We came upon a huge mud puddle that took up the entire trail. I stopped at the edge of it while Red walked through it. He got a few feet beyond it when he noticed I was lagging behind. "What's up?" he said when he saw I was still standing on the other side. "You ain't afraid of a little mud are you?"

In answer I stepped back a little bit from my side of the puddle and then with a loud whoop went charging towards the mud puddle. When I got to the edge of it I made a wild jump and came down with both feet in the middle of it. Muddy water sprayed all over. I misjudged my landing and ended up flat on my back causing another fountain of muddy water. I finally made it to the edge and was wearing a big grin when I stood up.

Red nodded at the sight of me. "Peter made a good choice, that's for sure." I was so proud of Red's praise, I thought I was going to burst. I noticed he hadn't made any move to get away from the muddy spray and that his hair and pelt had muddy water dripping off it. We started off again, my sneakers making squishing sounds as they hit the ground.

"Are we there yet?" I asked. It seemed like it was taking forever for us to get to this tree.

"Soon. It always takes longer to get back then it does to go. But before we get there, there's one more thing we should do." He led me off the path we were on and into a boggy area. "You're going to get really tired of stew. We all do, but ya can't say anything to Stumble about it. Hey, you don't cook, do you?" He had such a hopeful look on his face that I had to laugh as I shook my head no. "Aw, that figures. It don't matter. There's lotsa other stuff to eat around here if you know what to look for. Like this place."

I stopped and took a deep breath. All I could smell was musty-smelling mud and soil. There was a hint of something else though and I took another deep breath. Then another. "Blueberries!"

"Yeah," Red said a bit disappointedly. "Last time I was here there were cranberries. Elves are all the time changing the stuff they grow. I didn't know they'd… Whoa! I guess you kinda like blueberries?"

I nodded because my mouth was stuffed with blueberries. They were the ripest, sweetest ones I'd ever had. They were huge as well, being about the size of marbles. I'd probably still be partaking of them, but I suddenly realized that Red was probably watching me. With an effort I restrained myself and put the last one in my mouth, slowly chewing to get the most out of it. "Uh, sorry 'bout that. I didn't mean to eat so many. I just hadn't had anything to eat for awhile and when I saw them, I just… you know."

"No big deal, man. I know what it's like. Wait 'til you've had nothing but stew for a fortnight. You'll probably be able to strip this whole grove by yourself." I didn't tell him I could probably have stripped it regardless. He gestured with his head in the direction we'd come and I followed him back out of the bog. A few yards and we came to a fork in the road. I started down the left one, but he quickly grabbed my arm and pulled be back. "Uh-huh. Not down there. Not yet."

"Why? What's down there?" The trail disappeared into more woods, so I couldn't tell what lay down it. It just felt as though I should go down that way for some reason I couldn't put my finger on. I'd heard the term 'siren song' before, but this was the first time I'd ever experienced it, even though this seemed to be a very mild one.

"It's an old orchard. I'll tell you about it later." I looked back and finally shrugged and followed him down the other trail.

Not long after that, we entered a small clearing. In the very center of the clearing there was a gnarled tree whose branches clawed towards the sky as though trying to catch a cloud. There was a long length of rope that snaked through the branches and ended with a hangman's noose hanging from one of the branches.

"Is this…?" I started to ask. I knew the awe in my voice had to be obvious.

"Yeah. C'mon." He led me to one of the branches. "What ya gotta do is climb up to your trap door, go through it, and slide down into the tree. It's easy."

"What if I…?"

"If you what? Nothing'll happen. It really is easy. Even Stumble can do it, and he's the clumsiest Lost Boy there is."

I thought about mentioning that Stumble now had world-class competition for that claim, but clumsiness wasn't what I was worried about. At least not this time. I was more concerned with something completely different. "What if I get to the trapdoor, and you know, I open it up and start in and then stop?"

"Stop? Why would you stop? It's not real scary or anything. It might be if you were a baby but you're a Lost Boy and we're the toughest there is on the island. No matter what the dwarves say."

"It's not that. It's because of…" I stopped and looked at Red who stared back at me with curiosity and absolutely nothing else. Taking heart that he wasn't sneering or laughing or something else I was used to, I tried to force the words out as quickly as possible. "It's not that I'm scared, at least not that I'm afraid. I'm just scared that… I'llgetintothetrapdooranddiscoverI'mtoofattogetthroughitandeveryonewillthingIsuck as a Lost Boy andI'llgetthrownout." My mouth snapped closed as I finished, and I looked at him waiting to see what would happen.

He stood there looking at me and I could almost see him carefully shoving spaces between words so he could figure out what I'd just said. Understanding dawned and he got a serious look on his face. "Don't worry about it Cubby. I promise you'll fit through there with no trouble. And even if you didn't, we wouldn't throw you out. Why do you think all of us are here? It's not cuz we're well-adjusted kids. All of us are screwed up in some way. If you _were_ perfect, you'd have never ended up here. Not to mention that we all take care of each other. It's not like anyone else is going to." He frowned as though there was something else he wanted to say, but decided against it. Instead the frown became what I'd come to know as his 'leadership face.' Now, climb up to where that branch is," he said pointing to one. Open the end of the cut off branch above it and just climb through."

I didn't say anything. There wasn't anything to say. I climbed up the tree without any trouble. To say that shocked me would have been a massive understatement. I pulled open what looked like the cut end of a huge limb but turned out to be a very well disguised door. My sneaker slipped and I managed to tumble into the doorway and started to slide.

The doorway opened onto a large slide with a steep drop. The doorway couldn't have been used in a long time because there were tons of cobwebs. It was so dark I couldn't see anything and I began to panic as it seemed I'd been falling a lot longer than I should have been. Just as I knew that I was going to keep falling forever, there was a rush of wind and I fell on my rump on a dirt floor.


	3. Chapter 3

Red laughed as I got up from the floor

"See? I told ya you wouldn't get stuck. Would I lie to you? Red gave me a crooked smile. I didn't think he'd actually come out and lie, at least not about something like this, but I could easily see where he might forget to tell the entire truth about something.

I looked around the room I'd fallen in. It definitely wasn't square and didn't appear to be real big. The room had a lot of sides and there were a tons of corners and cubbies that were hidden in shadow or darkness. The walls, ceiling and floor were dirt. The ceiling had what looked like roots hanging from it and I figured those must have been from Hangman's Tree itself. There was a recessed area in one wall which contained a huge wooden chair which must have been Peter's 'throne.' In another area of the room there was a wooden table that looked as though it probably weighed a ton surrounded by a bunch of rough wooden benches. It had gouges and scrapes in the top of it, along with a bunch of gourds sitting on top. The gourds looked as though they had remnants of stew or soup or something like that in them. The table looked to be the type that would take great delight in sending a lot of splinters your way if you weren't careful. Behind the table was a large fireplace. It had a small fire burning in one corner. Above the flames, hanging from a hook, was a small cauldron. I'd come to be way too familiar with the contents of that particular item. Along with the fire in the fireplace, there were a few lanterns and a couple of torches burning to provide a light that waxed and waned across the room. Scattered haphazardly around the room were several hammocks with blankets and pelts overflowing them and piled on the ground below. A few of the walls had floor level openings that were curtained off. There was also a very small curtained opening in one of the walls a few feet off the floor. I wondered if that was Tinkerbell's flat.

While I had been looking around the room, Red had gone to a huge trunk and pushed some blankets and furs off the top of it. He was busy rummaging through it and had a small pile of things next to it. I watched as he pulled a broken slingshot out of the trunk and tossed it on the floor. "Alright, I knew it was in here somewhere." He leaned into the trunk and started pulling something out. There was a great crash of marbles, rocks, and other things as they fell off whatever it was Red was pulling out of the trunk.

"What's that?" I asked as the object of Red's search came into view. It looked like an enormous brown furry blanket and smelled musty. There was some dried mud and dirt on it and when he shook it a cloud of dust slowly rose to the ceiling causing Red to start coughing.

"This is your pelt, of course." He shook it again and then held it up so it looked a lot more like the bear pelt it was supposed to be. I wondered how long it had been in the trunk.

"Are you sure it's for me?" I asked doubtfully. "It's huge. I'll be swimming in it."

"Naw you won't. Just put it on. Roo will use your old stuff as bandages or something." He handed me the pelt which was insanely heavy and pointed to one of the curtained off doorways. "You can use that to change if you want."

I went through the opening and turned around to carefully pull the curtain or blanket or whatever it was back in front of the doorway. I wasn't a big believer in my body image at the moment. After making sure the curtain was across the doorway, I turned around and saw a pirate standing in front of me. He had on some sort of leather vest, breeches, and was holding a rapier that was ready to slice me to ribbons. I let out a yell and backed up as quickly as possible, proceeding to get all tangled up in both the bear pelt and the curtain. I was still yelling as I ended up rolling around the floor trying to escape from all the stuff I'd ended up tangled in. When I finally got my head cleared of the stuff, I looked up to find Red looking in the doorway with a lethal looking dagger in his hand. I could have sworn the tail of his fox pelt was twitching in agitation, but that should have been impossible. "What's wrong?" he demanded, continuing to look through the doorway.

"Th… There's a pirate in there. A big, mean looking one. He was going to gut me."

Red looked around for a moment and then went through the doorway. I waited for yelling, screaming, battle-cries, or at the very least the sound of steel clanking together. None of that occurred. After a moment Red came out carrying something. "Is this what you saw?" he asked as he leaned a large mirror against the wall.

I looked at the mirror and felt my face go red. "You mean I was looking in a… Wait a second. No way. I saw a pirate. Even though the light wasn't good, I know I saw a pirate. It couldn't have been the mirror I saw."

"Aw, it's okay. It's my fault anyway. I forgot that was in there. It's kind of a magic mirror that sometimes shows stuff that's not there but could be there sometime."

"Huh?" I asked intelligently as I carefully stuck my head in front of the mirror again. I held my breath until a big red-haired boy looked back.

"It just depends," Red tried to explain. "Sometimes when you look in the mirror, instead of seeing yourself, you'll see stuff that might happen to you."

"You mean a pirate is going to try and stab me?"

Red laughed. "You don't need no magic mirror to figure that out. Just being a Lost Boy means that's going to come true. At least the try part. Sometimes the stuff it shows never happens. Most of the time, in fact. It's probably broken which would figure cuz it ended up here. We end up with a lot of broken stuff but you can make really neat things out of them sometimes." He looked at the mirror again. "Good thing you didn't break it. You'd have 21 years of bad luck."

"Twenty-one? It's only supposed to be seven."

"Yeah, but it's magic. Sort of. Anyway, you need to get in your pelt before Peter catches you in that 'real' world stuff. He has to make sure that no one might mistake you for him."

I was pretty sure only someone who was wearing dark glasses and had a white cane would have a chance of mistaking me for Peter Pan. I didn't say anything and took the pelt once again. Red pointed out another curtained doorway, and after making sure there wasn't anyone staring back at me, went into it. This room was full of wooden boxes. Everything from tiny ones to ones bigger than I was. They were all jumbled as though someone had just tossed them in here. It only took a minute to get out of my old clothes. It took a lot longer than a minute to get the bear pelt on. It wasn't a two-piece top and bottom and there didn't appear to be any zippers, buttons or snaps. After several false starts, I finally managed to get it on. I was more than a little disappointed that the pelt I thought I would end up 'swimming in' was actually just a bit tight around the middle. That was good for another sigh.

The pelt wasn't too bad, just sort of funny feeling. I took a close look at the fur on one of the arms and noticed some tiny black things moving through it. I suddenly had an uncontrollable urge to start scratching all over. It was kind of warm, so I rolled up the sleeves to my elbows. The pelts sock mocs weren't attached to the pelt itself and went on just like slippers. They did have claws at the end of them, and predictably I managed to cut myself on one. The hood, which had two bear ears attached to it, fit over my head, but didn't come close to covering my shaggy mane of red hair.

When I stepped back into the big room, Red had been joined by Leo and Tigger. "He's the right size for a bear, but can he fight like one?" Tigger asked with a grin.

"We won't know that 'til we figure out what he can fight with," Leo said as he started rummaging through the infamous trunk. He pulled out a sword, some sort of knife, a bow, and a few other odds and ends. "Let's see what you can fight with Furball," he said in a friendly manner. I wasn't sure about the 'Furball' but wasn't about to start complaining. I watched in awe as each of them seemed to jump up and disappear through their exits. Figuring there might be some magic involved or that it must be easier than it looked, I gave it a shot. I jumped and probably got all of three inches off the ground. I tried again and wasn't sure I got that high the second time. The ceiling wasn't that high, but was high enough that I wasn't going to reach it.

I looked around and noticed the benches around the table once again. I grabbed one and dragged it under my temporary trap door. I got on top of it, lifted my arms in the air and still wasn't tall enough. There was no way I was going to try and jump from the bench. For a moment I thought about putting another bench on top of this one, but just one by itself was shaky enough. Thinking the table might be tall enough, I jumped down off the bench and ran to where the table was. I grabbed the corner, pulled, and nothing happened. I went to the other side, pushed, and nothing happened. I stepped back until I was right in front of the fireplace, ran to the table, and nothing happened except that I fell on my rump and had the breath knocked out of me.

Remembering the room full of wooden boxes, I went and started looking for one. After a couple of minutes of searching, I found one that looked perfect. I dragged it over to the bench and lifted it up on it. The bench didn't seem any more wobbly than before. I stood on the bench and then stepped on the wooden box. For a moment my fingers touched the edge of the trap door and then there was a horrendous 'crunching' sound and I found myself about a foot-and-a-half shorter than I had been. My feet had gone through the top of the box and I was now stuck standing on the bench. I tried to pull my feet out, but they were jammed tight. To make matters even better, there was a stench erupting from the box. It was too awful to say it stank and too strong to say it was drifting from the box. My eyes were already beginning to water and I watched with some alarm as the fleas in the pelt began abandoning it.

Before I could even begin to decide what to do, Red came tumbling back through his trap door. "You okay? What's taking you… Holy grail of the elves. What is that?" He pinched his nose with his fingers and backed away as far as he could.

"I don't know. I couldn't get out my trapdoor cuz I couldn't jump high enough and tried to climb on this and broke it and now I can't get out and I think I'm going to puke."

"Grooooooss. You should go for it. It'd have to smell better than that stuff. Wait here a minute, I'll be right back."

"Ha. Ha," I said in response to the command to wait, but Red had already fled through his trapdoor. After a couple of beats, Red returned with Leo and Tigger. This time there was no tumbling but a very slow entry which ended with all of them back against one of the walls.

"Phew, that stinks," Tigger decided.

"You think?" his brother replied. "What _is_ that? I bet this is some of your stuff."

"Whatcha mean my stuff? Why's it have to be my stuff? It's not like I'd have any use for stuff like that." Through tearing eyes I watched Leo stare at his twin. "Okay, but I wouldn't have put it in a box. At least not a box like that. Not one that would… Aw, forget about that. We need to get that stuff out of here."

Red rummaged through the trunk and came up with four clothespins. Each of them carefully attached it to their noses and Red came up to where I was stuck and clamped the remaining one on mine. "Much better." I agreed even though my nose now felt like it was on fire because of the clothespin.

After a lot of pulling and pushing and sarcastic-sounding grunting and groaning the three managed to get me out of the box. I looked down at my paws and saw that they were now an alarming electric-pink color. With a look of disgust, Red pointed to the side of the box. The words 'stinky stuff' had been scrawled across the side I hadn't seen in huge letters with what looked like crayon. Red glared at Tigger who replied with an angelic look of innocence. Both Red and Leo muttered darkly as they hauled pieces of the box out through their individual doors.

Tigger sprinkled me with pixie dust and told me to think happy thoughts (like not stinking anymore). After a minute I rose to the ceiling, bumped my head on it and finally managed to get through my trapdoor. I still couldn't get over the idea of flying and knew I had to be grinning like an idiot as I tumbled out of the top of the tree and hit the ground.

"What am I going to do about this?" I asked Red, pointing at my pink paws.

"I think you're going to need a bath."

"What? Lost Boys aren't supposed to take baths. It's in the rules."

"Rules? Lost Boys don't have rules. That's one of the… uhhhhh… never mind." Tigger dropped that thought and went over to look at the pieces of crate from the 'stinky stuff' box. I had a feeling we'd be smelling that stuff again one day.

"We still need to figure out what he's good with, too," Leo reminded Red as he dropped a bunch of weaponry on the ground that he'd gone back in to get.

"Well you sure can't test him when he has pink paws. That just wouldn't work right and all we'd need is a bunch of elves to wander by while he was doing it. We'd never hear the end of it."

"Yeah, but a bath? I mean I just got here and…"

"That's okay, Cubby. If you want pink paws and a certain scent we wouldn't dream of making you take a bath." Leo said with the utmost sincerity. "Of course I wouldn't want to be in your paws if Pan sees you, but I guess you've already thought about that."

Actually thinking through the pink paws part a bit more would have been sufficient to make me change my mind about the bath. I could probably get used to the odor, but electric-pink paws were sort of jarring. "Fine. Where is this bathing/swimming hole?"

Red gave me directions and told me I shouldn't have any problem finding it at all. "It's pretty simple. I don't think anyone's ever gotten lost in that part of the woods before. When you come back, we'll see what weapons you're good with. We'll have you fighting pirates before you know it." I shuddered as the image of the pirate I'd seen in the mirror came unbidden to my mind as I started off for my first bath on the Island.


	4. Chapter 4

The directions to the swimming hole were pretty clear and it didn't take me long to find it. It was just a wide area in a creek that had been worn pretty deep by something. There wasn't any sort of beach or slant from the shore to the water, it was just a drop off that looked like it was about a four feet deep. I looked around and decided the best thing to do was dive right into it wearing the pelt. I thought about testing the water but it was a pretty warm day and I knew if it was too cold, I'd chicken out. I closed my eyes, held my nose and jumped in paws first.

I was pretty sure I cut off the yell before it got too far. The innocent looking swimming hole I'd jumped into felt like it must have been just a degree above freezing and I reacted in an appropriate manner. Yelling. All I could do was inhale cuz my body refused to exhale and lose all the warmth in my breath. I stood there for a long time until my teeth stopped chattering and the water began to feel not warm, but not as though it was ice either. I tried stamping my feet up and down, but could still see the neon pink through the clear water. It didn't look like the stamping was having any effect at all. I lifted my left foot and tried to scrape the stuff off with my hand, but still didn't have any luck. That's when I noticed my right leg. I don't know where they'd come from, but there were like hundreds of small fish looking things nibbling on my pelt. At first I tried to shake them away, thinking they might get sick if they ate the pink stuff, but they seemed to be enjoying it without any ill effects. I carefully put my left foot down and another batch swarmed that leg and foot as well. I stood there bemused as the fish looking things proceeded to finish off the rest of the neon pink stuff in short order and then scattering from wherever they came from. They moved so fast that I wouldn't have been surprised if someone had told me they simply vanished.

I climbed out of the swimming hole, a process that probably would have looked hilarious to anyone watching, and flopped down on my back next to it. The breeze was still warm and I decided I probably had enough time to lay here and get dry before I headed back to the tree. I closed my eyes and let the sound of the birds lull me to a doze. After all, it had been awhile since I'd had any sleep. I didn't think falling towards the sea really counted.

It was either because the birds weren't singing no more or because I'd heard something that didn't belong. I could sleep like the dead until I heard something that didn't sound right or normal. I kept my eyes closed and listened. There wasn't a sound anywhere except for the creek talking to itself. I opened my eyes, sat up and looked around, but didn't see anything that hadn't been there when I'd arrived. The front of the bear pelt was nice and dry but the back of it was still soggy. I lay down on my stomach so the back of the pelt could get dry. I kept looking around, but still couldn't see anything. The birds didn't start singing, but there weren't any other noises either. I kept visualizing in my mind the horrible things that were sneaking up on me, even though my feet were pointed to the creek and I'd have heard anyone coming from that direction splashing. There was no way I was dozing off now.

My resolution of not dozing off managed to slip away somehow. This time I knew that the thing that woke me up was something brushing my face. I kept my eyes squinched closed while horrible visions of pirates or dragons or lions brushing against my face before they attacked ran through my mind. I couldn't take it any longer, so I let out a fearsome yell (okay, it was more of the frightened squeak variety), rolled over, and got to my feet. I then proceeded to trip over my feet and landed with a splash in the swimming hole. I slowly poked my head above the water and looked where I'd been lying to see a frog looking at me as though I was crazy. "Gorp?" it asked.

"Geeze," I said to myself, as I climbed out of the swimming hole once again. "Some Lost Boy I am. Scared to death of a frog and clumsy as…" I tried to think of something that would be the ultimate in clumsy but only kept coming back to me. The frog took another look at me, made a statement in frog that sounded less than flattering, and jumped into the swimming hole. Grumbling to myself, I headed back into the forest, a loud 'squrping' sound coming from the pawmocs with each step. At least they weren't neon pink anymore. I hadn't gotten far when someone stepped out from behind a tree next to the trail I was on. This time I was more than eager for my heart to leap into my throat because it was the pirate that I'd seen in the mirror complete with rapier and evil expression.

"Well, well. What have we here? Don't recall seeing you round these parts before. Seeing how you're dressed up in that fur thing, you must be a replacement for that brat that didn't make it home. Wonder if you'll scream as loud as he did." The grin on his face scared me more than the rapier that he now had held against my chest.

Naturally there was only one thing to do in a situation like this. I made a very loud noise, turned around faster than thought, and took off as fast as I could. As you've probably figured out, I don't really run very fast. In fact it's more of a gallop/trot than anything. Yet being pretty craven, I can move pretty fast when I suddenly think I'm getting ready to die. This was such a case. I ran down the trail as fast as I could and for awhile was pulling ahead of the pirate. My maneuver had taken him by surprise, but he'd managed a swing or a stab or something and I felt something hot along my left side. Now the pirate was busy following me and cursing as fast as he could in both cases. I had no idea where I was going, but even terrified remembered the one thing Peter had told me. No one must ever find out where Hangman's Tree was. I was moving as fast as my legs would carry me in the opposite direction and fear was giving wings to the pawmocs. Unfortunately every time I looked back, the pirate had caught up with me even more. The good news was that it looked like he was on his own. At least there wasn't any other yelling for others that would indicate more than the one chasing me.

Wings and fear are very good things when it comes to moving as fast as you can. Yet there's one other thing you need and that's traction. The trail that I was running down dipped into a mud puddle. My left foot came down in it after which my natural clumsiness took over. I fell heels-over-head and came down in a heap in the middle of the trail. The pirate, who must have been right behind me, managed to avoid wiping out in the puddle but did crash into the heap of Lost Boy that was taking up all the trail. By the time he came to a stop, I was already on my feet (when you're clumsy, you learn how to get up quickly even if it means you end up on your rump again). It took a lot longer for the pirate to get up and by the time he was on his feet, I'd had an opportunity to look around in total panic.

On one side of the path was a perfect climbing tree. Not really realizing that if I could climb it, anyone with two arms and two legs could, I started up. This was a huge pine tree that looked as though it were a hundred feet or more in height. By the time I'd gotten a few feet up the trunk, I had pine tar smeared all over my hands, face and pelt. I even had it in my hair which didn't really seem very fair since I had the hood of the pelt pulled up.

"Brilliant move, Brat. You certainly ain't going to be jumping out o' there and I'll be able to cut ya to ribbons without even breaking a sweat." He stuck the rapier in the sash around his waist and then started climbing after me, the manic grin getting wider. "Ol' Cap'n Hook'd prefer you walk the plank as it be the pirate way, but he don't much care if there be one or two accidents along the way. Maybe I'll bring him that nice pelt so he can have it in his cabin as a rug."

I hesitated for a moment as I got furious. While I didn't really want to die at the moment for a lot of reasons, the thought of my pelt being used as a pirate's rug made me see red. I climbed up a few more feet to where a dead branch was sticking out from the trunk. I could reach it if I stood on tiptoe on the limb I was on and figured I could use it as a weapon if I could snap it off. At least it was as long as his rapier and he'd be fighting from below so I should have some sort of advantage. I knew if I kept repeating that last part, it would eventually come true.

Stretching as far as I could, I managed to get one of my big paws on the branch and started trying to move it back and forth. Below me the sound of the pirate let me know he was getting closer. I was lightly bouncing on the limb I was standing on, trying to get enough momentum to break the branch I was holding onto. Finally, I was rewarded with a dry snap. My paw slipped from the branch I was trying to break off as I discovered the loud crack had come from the limb I was standing on. I'd swear it was a couple of seconds before gravity suddenly realized I was no longer being supported by something.

I fell a couple of feet before my pawmoc hit the first branch causing me to sort of pinwheel until the next branch's turn. My back hit that one, breaking it off at the trunk and putting me in an upside down position. This led to my next branch strike being on my head and producing a whole sea of stars for me to gaze at as I continued to plummet. I was horizontal when I hit the pirate. I gotta admit, the look on his face right before I hit him was pretty cool. It's the first time I think I've ever seen someone look as scared as I felt. My falling on him sheared him off from where he was standing and we both fell about twenty more feet through a bunch of branches. My fall was cushioned by a mud puddle that shouldn't have existed. It took me a lot longer to get up than it had earlier. Every part of my body was sore but not the 'broken bone' sort of sore. The pirate had fallen on his back and was laying there with his eyes closed. He was still breathing and didn't seem to have any broken bones or blood spurting out of him. I nudged him gently with my foot to make sure he wasn't playing possum and then started to trot cross-country through the trees. I didn't get too far when I remembered something. I turned around and went back to where the pirate was still laying. I snuck up on him and then as fast as I could grabbed the rapier, expecting any moment for him to wake up and destroy me or something. Once I had the rapier, I took off cross-country again. I wasn't sure how unconscious he was and didn't want to take a chance he'd be able to follow me back to Hangman's Tree.

I galloped as far as I could before collapsing in the middle of nowhere. There was nothing to see around me but trees, fallen leaves and dappled sunlight. The birds were singing here, though, and there was the rustle of what I hoped were very small animals. My side was throbbing, but it wasn't a real bad cut or anything. The pelt had a distinct reddish tinge where it had been cut, but there didn't seem to be any new stuff leaking out. I truly hoped that Red hadn't been teasing me when he said a Lost Boy could always find his way back to Hangman's Tree, no matter what. I stood there and closed my eyes trying to clear all my thoughts except what was now home and waited for sudden enlightenment as to which way to go. It didn't happen. I started to panic as I realized I was completely lost. I wondered if anyone would find my body after I died of either hunger or being frozen to death or having been eaten by some large animal. After a couple of minutes, I laughed at myself. There wasn't a whole lot of chance of me starving to death anytime soon. The weather was still warm, so I doubted I was going to freeze to death in the bear pelt tonight or this week. Any animal large enough to be able to eat me… Okay, two out of three wasn't bad.

After deciding I wasn't going to drop dead in the next few minutes, I started walking. There wasn't any particular direction I was trying to go in. No looking for moss at the base of trees (which actually surrounded the trunks and didn't grow mostly on any one side). No trying to keep a straight line. I was pretty sure I wasn't going in circles because some of the rocks and trees I saw looked very weird and I'd have remembered them if I'd seen them twice. I kept listening to make sure I heard birds singing and for the most part I did. There was one moment that I panicked because the birds suddenly went silent. If that wasn't enough, at the same time that happened I could have sworn I saw a wolf a fair distance away through the trees. I froze for what was almost forever, but the birds were singing again and I was easily able to convince myself that it would have been impossible to have seen a wolf that far away and started walking again. Red had mentioned wolves earlier, but he'd said they were in the hills and this area was pretty flat. Plus I was pretty sure wolves didn't get to be the size of ponies. Right?

Pushing through a bunch of bushes that had grown close together, I almost fell on my face as I passed out of the forest and onto a huge meadow. It wasn't just big, it was giant. There was a feeling about the place that was calm and made me think of the good things that had come my way. At the opposite end of the meadow from where I was standing was a massive oak tree that seemed to stretch into the sky. There was something under the oak tree, but I couldn't make it out. Not really knowing where else to go, I followed my nose towards the tree. About the time I got to the middle of the meadow, I saw that what I'd seen under the tree was a person dressed in a rabbit costume watching me cross the meadow. No, I reminded myself, a rabbit pelt. I thought that was weird cuz no one had mentioned a Lost Boy dressed as a rabbit. The funny thing is that if I looked at him too long, he seemed to blur in and out of focus like what happens when you look at stuff on a road when it's a hot summer day.

I kept walking towards the tree and eventually reached it. The person underneath it looked to be about my age and was wearing a tan coloured rabbit pelt. He was sitting underneath the tree, leaning his back against the trunk. He grinned. "Hey, Cubby."

"Uh, hi. Are you a Lost Boy too?"

"Kind of. It's sorta a long story, but you can ask Red about it. He'll tell you. I'm Nibbler by the way and just so you don't worry about whether I'm a real Lost Boy or not, I know that Stumble fixes a mean stew that you'll love no matter what. Nice sword," he said nodding towards the rapier I still had from the pirate.

"Oh," I said sort of embarrassed. I went on to explain what had happened getting both gasps of surprise and peals of laughter. Strangely enough it felt sort of good that I was able to make him laugh. It wasn't a sarcastic or mean laugh, but one like I'd told a good joke or something like that.

"I think you'll make a good Lost Boy. Just don't be too hard on yourself, okay?" He looked around. I didn't see anything, but he suddenly stood up and announced he had to go.

"Are you going to Hangman's Tree?" I asked, hoping he could show me the way.

"Naw, I kind of live someplace else," he said, taking the meadow in with a sweep of an arm. "We just hang around here sometimes cuz we like to remember and play. Anytime you want to come by, feel free. You can even climb this tree if you want. It's perfect for it."

The whole thing still seemed sort of weird, but not in a frightening way, just different. I didn't know that there were Lost Boys who didn't live in Hangman's Tree and there weren't any tents or anyplace to live in the meadow. "If you're not going to the tree, can you tell me how to get back there?"

"Aw, Cubby, I don't need to tell you that. You're almost there. You're a Lost Boy, just follow your nose."

I looked in the direction I'd been heading. "You mean Red was right when he said I'd always know how to get back to the tree?" There was no answer and when I turned around, I found myself alone under the tree. I carefully looked up in the branches and around the tree and the meadow, but didn't see any sign of Nibbler. Shrugging and making a note to ask Red about it if I ever got back to the tree, I started off again.

The trees on this side of the meadow weren't as thick and it was a lot easier to get through them. I still wasn't trying to go in any particular direction, but was just letting my paws lead the way. As I do pretty often, I started to woolgather and managed to fall flat on my face as the terrain changed from woods to trail. Only I could managed to make it through the woods without falling and immediately trip over a cleared trail.

This trail looked familiar, though. Not 50 feet from where I was standing, there was a very familiar fork in the road. One that Red had taken me over earlier that day. I walked to where it was, and took a few steps down the path that led to the apple orchard. For some reason I wanted to run the rest of the way and explore it and see what it held. At the same time, there was a voice in the back of my mind that was busy flying into hysterics over even the remote possibility that I might go that way. I stared down it for a little while longer but there wasn't really anything to see because the path dipped down out of site. "One day," I promised myself in extremely uncharacteristic manner as I turned and trudged back to Hangman's Tree. Somehow I managed to get lost less than ten feet away from it, but I figure that was because I was thinking too hard. I found my hidden trapdoor and made my way through it, landing on my rump in the middle of the common room floor.

"Whoa! What happened to you?" Red asked, staring at my bloody, muddy, pine sap covered pelt. "And where'd you get the sword?"


	5. Chapter 5

It's a real good thing you want to take a bath," Red commented as he sat on the common room table, practicing swinging the rapier I'd brought back with me in the air in front of him. "I'd hate to think what you'd look like if you'd gone out to get dirty."

"It's not my fault. You didn't say that there'd be a bunch of pirates waiting for me so they could drag me to the _Jolly Roger._ See if I ever take a bath again. Owww!" Roo was looking at the cut in my side under where the bear pelt had been neatly cut open and was pouring some sort of stinky liquid over it that burned.

"If ya don't want to get hurt then ya shouldn't be playing with pirates," Roo said as he took a critical look at the cut again. "As pirate injuries go, that's pretty slight."

"Pirate-s?" Tigger asked, giving me a grin. "I thought you said there was only of them."

"There could have been more. Maybe."

"So you just fell out of the tree and clobbered him, huh? That was pretty good thinking. You may fit in after all," Leo said, sounding a little impressed.

"It was kinda, sort of an accident," I admitted. When I'd told the story, I'd just said that I'd fallen out of the tree. I really didn't emphasize the fact that it was an involuntary tumble.

"It don't matter. As long as it worked is what counts most. But why'd you climb a tree to begin with?"

I thought about that. There hadn't really been any reason except desperation and I didn't know how well that would go over. "Cuz I couldn't outrun him, so I figured maybe I could out climb him or something like that. I didn't know pirates could climb trees. Least I never thought about it and there didn't seem like anything else to do and I was afraid he'd kill me."

"Naw, he wouldn't have killed you," Red said with a malicious grin on his face. "He'd have taken you to Hook who would have tried to use you as bait to catch Pan and us, and _then_ he would have killed you right after you refused to become a pirate. You would have refused, right?"

"You mean there's Lost Boys who've become pirates?" I asked in disbelief. I couldn't imagine of such a thing happening. It seemed impossible. Of course less than a day ago I'd have figured that me being able to fly through the air and being sliced by a pirate would have seemed impossible too.

Leo and Red exchanged glances. "It don't happen very often and we talk about it even less. Let's just say that in the rare case a Lost Boy grows up there ain't a whole lot of options around." I thought about that for a few minutes. Even if I were to grow up, something I'd probably open a vein over before I'd allow that to happen, I couldn't see becoming a pirate. How could you be a Lost Boy and then turn against your brothers to become a pirate? I shuddered at the thought.

"Don't worry 'bout it," Tigger said, as if reading my thoughts. "It don't happen very often and none of us, including you, would ever do that. Besides, there's other stuff that's got to be done now."

"What's that?"

"We gotta find out what you're good at using. Can't have you wandering around with pirates attacking you without a way to attack back at them. Last one out's a turtle booger." With that as a signal, Lost Boys started flying all over the place. I watched a little enviously as they bounded from the floor to their respective trapdoors without seeming to make any effort at all. In an instant only Leo and I were left standing in the common room.

"Here," he said as he reached into one of his pockets and pulled out a bag. He opened it took a few pinches of pixie dust out and scattered it over my head. "This should make it a bit easier for ya this time." I tried thinking happy thoughts of orcas and sea lions and sprang towards my trapdoor. I didn't get very far off the ground and sighed. Leo added some more pixie dust.

"You're trying too hard," he explained. "You're a Lost Boy now and that means you'll be able to do it without pixie dust soon. It just takes awhile."

"But…"

"Naw, it ain't size or weight either. It's magic. Things that are a 'big' deal in the real world ain't such a bother on the island. You'll get the hang of it, don't worry. Now give it a shot."

I hunkered down, bending my knees, and jumped as hard as I could. I went flying through the air and hit the ceiling right next to where the trap door was. My teeth clacked together and I was glad my tongue hadn't been in the corner of my mouth like it gets sometimes when I'm concentrating real hard. A shower of dirt fell around me and I knew I was going to have a huge lump on my head. From below me I heard the sounds of a struggle. "It's okay, go ahead and laugh. I'd do the same thing if I'd seen what I just did." From below me the attempt to keep one's mouth clamped shut changed to peals of genuine laughter. I had to laugh at the sound of it as I gently made my way through the trapdoor and outside.

Red beckoned me over to where the stuff they'd brought out earlier was piled together. There were slingshots, swords, daggers, cutlasses, a couple of sticks that were attached to each other with a chain, a huge axe, a couple of different bows and various other odds and ends. Scattered among the weapons were a few pieces of armor. There was a shield or two, a piece that looked like it was for a torso (that had a huge red bull's eye painted on it but in a square instead of a circle), a helm that had a great dent in the back of it and even a Viking helmet. "Anything jump out at you?" Red asked as I started shifting through the pile.

"Wow, this is sorta cool," I said as I examined a dagger and promptly cut the tip of my finger on it. "You mean I can try anything?" I asked, removing the cut finger from my mouth.

"Sure. How else are ya going to know what's best for you to use?" Leo asked, joining us from his trapdoor.

"Hey, you're a turtle booger," Tigger said to his brother.

"Naw, he's not. I am, I guess. He was helping me and that's why he's last. Do turtles even have boogers?"

Tig shrugged. "Doesn't matter if they do or not if you are one." He pointed to a hilt that was sticking out of the pile. "Why don't you give that one a try? It's pretty small."

I shrugged and pulled it out of the pile causing the clang of crashing metal. It wasn't just the sword, but a scabbard too. The scabbard looked like it was made of leather and was plain looking. The hilt of the sword was gold and looked as though someone had spent a lot of time working it. I held the scabbard in one hand and the hilt in the other and pulled. Nothing happened. I tried again, harder, with the same result. I thought maybe I was pulling too hard, so I tried pulling it slowly, but it remained stuck fast.

Tig stared at me with a confused look on his face. "It shouldn't be that hard. Maybe it got wet or something. Here, lemme try." I handed the scabbard over to him. He took it, put the scabbard end on the ground and pulled and pushed at the hilt before the sword finally loosened and came out of the scabbard. "Maybe you loosened it," he suggested. He put the sword back in and handed to me. "You try."

I took it back from him, casually attempted to pull the sword and once again, nothing happened. By the time I gave up this time, I was red in the face and felt as thought I'd galloped through a marathon or something.

"You know if it takes you that long to get your sword out of the scabbard, you're probably going to be leaking blood," Tig said matter-of-factly as he took it once again out of my fingers that were beginning to loose all feeling in them from yanking so hard. He held the scabbard vertically against the ground and made a great show of pulling on the hilt and the sword slowly eased from the scabbard once again. "I dunno, Cubby. I'd figure you were strong enough to pull a sword out. Maybe you should try something lighter." He put the sword back into the scabbard. "You should try as hard as you can. In fact, I tell ya what. I'll hold the scabbard and you pull the hilt, okay? Just give it a huge yank. I bet you get it out this time."

I took the hilt in my hand and grinned at Tig. I'd been paying attention when he'd pulled the sword out the second time and had noticed that he'd made sure the bottom of the scabbard was on the ground before he'd started pulling it. He was holding it horizontally now and had his left hand near the end of it. I made a great production of bracing myself and inhaling and exhaling. I clenched my fists over and over, just to get the blood flowing and then spat on both hands to be sure nothing slipped. Tig nodded in approval at the preparations. I carefully took the hilt by two hands and started pulling. It looked good, but I was hardly pulling at all. When I saw Tig's hand go to the end of the scabbard, I gently pulled the sword out.

Leo smirked as Red started laughing loudly. "You got had," Red said between laughs. "You didn't figure he'd figure out that trick sword, did ya?"

Tig's surprised face became sour looking for a moment, then cheered up. "That was pretty good. I'm going to have to remember you figured that out on the fly. This is going to be fun, I bet."

"Better watch your back," Leo advised. "He's going to want to get you back pretty quick and in a big way for ruining his first joke on ya."

"I wouldn't do that. Least no more than normal." There was hurt innocence in Tigger's voice that I was pretty sure was false.

"So if we're done with that, how about showing him something that he might really be able to use?"

Tigger walked over to the small pile and moved some stuff around. He finally pulled out a plain looking sword that wasn't too long. "Here, try this one and see if it works." He was suddenly all business. "Try not to swing it too hard or you might lose control but at the same time don't be tapping with it either. You want to swing hard enough to get their attention. Oh, don't miss either. If you miss, whoever you're fighting with is just going to stab you or cut your head off."

I took a couple of swings through the air. The sword was heavier than it looked but wasn't too hard to move through the air. I made another cut that was faster and heard the air whiz as the sword cut through it. "Try just a little bit harder," Red said. Trying to be a little impressive, I swung hard and didn't think about where my feet or knees were. It was a good swing, but unfortunately the sword seemed to absorb momentum. My knees did some sort of twisting thing as my feet buried themselves in the soil. The next thing I knew I'd made a complete circle and as I managed to trip over my own feet, let go of the sword. That wouldn't have been too bad if I hadn't been trying to show-off. As it was, when I let go of the sword it flew through the air and buried its tip in the trunk of a tree. A tree that Stumble had been standing next to, watching.

"Hey! Watch it."

"We may have found someone clumsier than Stumble. He must have heard about your stew, Stumble. Normally it ain't 'til after they taste it that they try to kill you though."

"Whatdaya mean by that?" Stumble said, starting to approach Tigger. "You saying I can't cook or something?"

"Naw, I didn't say that," Tigger said. "I was just…"

"I love stew," I said to Stumble. I guess no one had said that to him in a long time because he stopped in surprise, forgetting his crusade against Tig.

"You do?" he asked. He appeared stunned by the whole thing and I began to wonder exactly how this stew really did taste. I nodded. I actually did like stew and wouldn't mind having some. "Awesome," he said. He walked over and pulled the sword out of the tree and handed it to me. Hilt first. "Don't worry about what happened, it was just an accident."

I was mystified by the sudden change in the raccoon-pelted boy's mood. Red explained to me later that Stumble was one of the most laid back and easy-going people ever, but that when the discussion turned to his stew, he became a whole different person. I resolved never to bring it up myself unless it was to praise it, and even that only after careful consideration. "I think we can pretty much rule out using a sword, at least for now. Maybe after you get some training you'll be better with one. How about a dagger?"

Leo mused over that and then vetoed his brother's idea. He should probably have something with a bit more reach than tha. His arms aren't real long and trying to fend off a sword might not work real well."

"There's that rapier he got. It's lighter than a sword," Red suggested.

"Yeah, that might work. Give that a try, Cubby." I picked up the rapier again and did some swinging with it. It made a great sound cutting through the air, but I wasn't sure how impressed any pirate would be over that. Leo must have realized the same thing cuz after watching me for a minute or two told Tig to get the target.

"How come I always have to get stuff?"

"Because you hid it last time and you're the only one who knows where it's at," Leo said, rolling his eyes at his brother.

"Yeah, well… never mind. I'm not putting it away this time." He disappeared off into the woods. There was a lot of crashing and the sound of ripping leaves, a very sharp crack and then a loud, muttered something I couldn't quite make out. Whatever happened, Red's face broke out into a huge smile before he managed to compose it into a look of complete innocence. Tigger reappeared from the woods carrying what had to be the most threadbare scarecrow in the world. It was wearing a shirt and breeches with dozens of holes, cuts, and other rips in it. Across the front of the shirt someone had painted 'PIERAT'. One arm ended in what had to be a whisk broom and the other in a wire hanger. The head was a canvas bag with a frown drawn on it and an eye patch attached to it. As Tig carried it to where we were, bits and pieces of straw and leaves littered the ground behind him as it fell out of the scarecrow. Tigger was carrying it with one hand and had the index finger of his other hand in his mouth.

"What happened to you?" Leo asked.

"Oh, nothing at all. Just that someone booby-trapped the target with a mouse trap so that when I picked it up it slammed my finger." He slowly looked at the rest of the boys. "I'm sure it must have been a pirate, or an elf or something like that since I'm positive it couldn't have been a Lost Boy who would do that." His eyes roamed the pack again and it seemed as though his eyes lingered on Red a little longer than anyone else. It could have been my imagination though. Red still wore an innocent expression, but not so innocent that it wouldn't be believed. I was busy biting the inside of my mouth so I wouldn't start laughing, especially when Tig looked at Red.

"Did it break the skin?" Leo asked. "Let me see it."

"No it didn't break the skin. Why would you even ask that? Does it matter?"

Leo sighed at Tigger's stubbornness. "If it broke the skin, we'd need to do something about it. But if it didn't, then we don't. Let me see it." Tigger again refused. I watched as Leo and Tigger discussed it. Leo never rose his voice and was patient beyond belief. Tigger started arguing, got louder, and then appeared to look almost guilty about the whole thing. In the end, he showed his brother his finger without a word. "Leo examined it, and apparently satisfied that the horrible rending of skin hadn't occurred, simply nodded. I looked at Red who made a tiny shake of his head which I guessed meant that I shouldn't say anything about it and that he'd tell me later. At least I hoped that's what it meant.

Once the whole injury thing was out of the way, Tigger immediately regained his good humour. "This is what we use for target practice," he explained to me as he tied it to the trunk of Hangman's Tree. "We keep it hidden just cuz if the pirates found it, they'd know they were close to our hideout. If the elves found it, they'd know we were _borrowing_ their straw or hay or whatever. We get the leaves for free though." He finished tying it to the tree and stood back. "It's a little cockeyed, but that's okay. Most pirates walk that way. Have at it, bearish dude."

"'Bearish dude'?" Surefoot said, looking at Tigger as though he'd lost his mind.

"I dunno. It sounded sort of cool." There were some howls of laughter and groans to that explanation before everyone turned to stare at me. I was about twenty yards from the 'pierat.' I held the rapier to my right side and ran at the target as fast as I could, my legs churning up dirt, mud and gravel behind me. As I approached the target, I raised the rapier above my head and swung it as hard as I could at the pirate. It made a very satisfying 'thunk' sound and I looked back at the others to see how they'd rate me.

"That's going to leave a welt," Tigger said, with a grin at me. A couple of the others laughed. I tried to figure out what was wrong. "Cubbs, you have to remember it's not a sword. You have to use the pointy thing on the end to stab. It was a good shot, though. If you'd been using a sword, he'd be bleeding straw all over the place right now." The way he talked let me know he wasn't making fun of me all that much, but was teaching me and having fun at the same time. I had definitely learned the difference between the two in the 'real' world. I nodded and walked back to where I'd started from. This time it was going to be perfect.

"C'mon, Cubby you can do it."

"Stab him in the gizzard."

"Show it what a Lost Boy can do." There was some clapping and whistling and I took off again, legs churning away. I was screaming "stab, stab, stab" to myself as I got closer to the target, the rapier still held at my right side, ,but more parallel to the ground this time. I'm not exactly sure what happened. Maybe I was just trying to hard or was too eager to show that I could use something. I was too far away from the target when I lunged to stab it. Somehow my body ended up moving faster than my legs were and as hard as they churned, they weren't able to catch up. I did have the presence of mind to keep the rapier up as far as I could, but I ended up skidding on my stomach and came to a stop as my head clonked the trunk of the tree. My hand went numb as the rapier hit something. There was a 'snick' of twine and in the next instant the scarecrow target had fallen off the tree trunk on top of me. The cheers and encouragement had come to an abrupt halt and I fancied I could actually hear the grass growing in the silence as I closed my eyes while wishing a great number of things..

"I don't think that's a real good omen," I heard someone say. I think it was Surefoot. "I don't know that anyone's ever been beaten by the target before."

"Yes there was. It was a kid named…" Whatever Stumble had been getting ready to say was cut off as the words turned to a mumble. Almost as though someone had put a hand over his mouth so he couldn't say anything. The sound of footsteps approached but I refused to raise my head, thinking that this would be a really great place to spend the rest of my life and maybe I'd get covered with leaves and snow (did it snow in Neverland?) and be forgotten.

"That was pretty good, Cub. You actually managed to cut the twine even though you were skidding along the ground. Ain't a whole lot who could do that all at once. Still, having it fall on top of you like that sorta means that you should probably use something else instead. You know, just in case it's a sign or something. There's a lotta other stuff you can try."

I didn't say a word, but just lay there wondering how I thought I could ever be a decent Lost Boy. I hadn't really figured there'd be so much stuff to know or figure out or whatever. There were more footsteps as someone joined Red. "Man, that's the biggest spider I've ever seen in my life. Looks poisonous, too."

"Where? Where? Get it off!" I said as I managed to go from lying prone on the ground with the scarecrow on top of me to instantly standing upright, turning around, and slamming my back against the tree trunk that the target had recently vacated.

Tigger laughed. "I was talking about Red, not you.

"Oh. Yeah." I suddenly realized that the scarecrow had been on top of my back. Red didn't seem at all upset over the possibility of a huge poisonous spider on his back and I realized that I'd been tricked into getting up. I couldn't help but grin about it. "Guess that was pretty dumb, huh?"

"Heck no, I'd have done the same thing if I thought there was a spider on my back. I hate spiders. They always leave webs around that you end up getting tangled in. They should have a lot more consideration. Like snakes or scorpions. They don't make stuff that gets in your face when all you want to do is walk down a trail or something."

"Uh, I meant the 'missing the target' part."

Tig shrugged. "No big deal. Sometimes it takes awhile to figure out what suits ya best. Heck, it took almost a whole week for Red here."

"Did not."

"Did too. Ask Leo. He'll agree with me."

"Course he will. He's your brother."

"Yeah, but you know that don't make a difference. You were just upset cuz Bucky thought that cutlass made you look cool. That is until you almost sliced your arm off when you fell that day."

"Yeah, yeah, okay. I give." Red had a sheepish expression on his face as if he realized he couldn't win this particular argument, fair fight or not. "Anyway, all it means is that you'll just have to try something else. It ain't the end of the world. There's lots of other stuff you can try. Let's go figure out something else.

The rest of the trials didn't turn out much better. By the time we were finished, the scarecrow, which had been tied back up to the tree, was pretty much intact, although there was a gaping hole in one side where somehow I'd managed to put my fist through the stuffing. Red's nose had a scrape across the front of it from where an arrow I'd shot had ricocheted from a tree branch and passed across his face. I managed to knock myself out with a heavy staff that Stumble insisted I try after saying I looked just like Little John. Leo had the beginning of a black eye from where he'd been hit by one of the sticks after the chain holding them both together had broken while I was swinging it. Roo thanked me after informing everyone that he hadn't had so much practice in ages. It was hard to tell when Roo was being sarcastic, but either way didn't make me feel real good. I was beginning to lose hope that I'd ever find something to use I was good at. I think the other Lost Boys were beginning to feel that way too. The bumps, bruises, and scrapes hadn't helped either. "We should just give him all that stuff and turn him loose on the _Jolly Roger_. They wouldn't stand a chance once he got going full-tilt."

"Naw, that won't work," Stumble pointed out. "What if he knocked himself out first? Like he did with that staff? They'd shred him."

"Hey, you were the one who said he looked like Little John."

"Who's Little John?" Surefoot asked.

"Never mind, I'll tell you later," Tigger replied. "You know we could always just give him a bunch of water balloons and some pixie dust and he could fly around the pirates, bombing them with water. That'd distract them."

"Oh yeah, that's real helpful," Leo said to his brother. He suddenly perked up. "Wait a second. He's wearing his pelt, maybe the best weapon for him is what he used too. I'll be right back."

I watched as Leo ran towards the tree, squirmed up it, and disappeared from sight through his trapdoor. "What's he mean?" I asked Red. "Who used to have this pelt?"

"You know. The kid who looked like you. It's been around awhile I think."

Before I could ask anything else, Leo was climbing back out of Hangman's Tree and carrying a big club of wood. He handed it to me. "Give that a try."

I held the club in my hands. The wood at the end had been smoothed from use and I could see slight indentations where fingers might have gone before mine. My fingers fit almost perfectly in them. Even though the wood was smooth, I could feel the wood grain where my fingers were. It felt both funny and right all at the same time. This time I didn't try any dramatics or running movements or anything like that. I walked over to where the scarecrow was and swung at it with the club. The pieces of the scarecrow seemed to explode all over, covering me and the surrounding ground with straw and leaves. There was a whistle of amazement from someone.

"You know what this means?" Leo said.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm going to have to re-stuff it," Tig said. "Guess that means I'll have to go _borrow_ some straw from the elves again. And a few other things, just in case."

I looked at the club. It wasn't the fanciest weapon or anything, but I was pretty sure I could use it pretty well now. I gave it a couple more tentative swings through the air and wondered if it might work for baseball too. Maybe not. "So now what?" I asked Red.

"You keep it with you at all times when you're out wandering. Me and Leo and maybe Surefoot will teach you to use a sword too. Leo can teach anyone." I wondered about that but decided I'd leave it for another day. "Now you get to help me carry all this junk back into the tree. I was sort of irked that he didn't let you try some of them inside first, but I'm glad he didn't now."

I started picking up stuff along with Tig and Red. The Viking helmet found its way into my hand and I stuck it on my head. "Hey, can I use this too?" I asked Red.

"You know that's plastic right? And that one of the horns is bent?"

"Yeah, I know. Somehow it seems to fit, though."

"Fine, knock yourself loose. I don't care. Just don't' figure it'll stop a cutlass or whatever those spiky balls are that have a stick attached to them with a chain."

"Pirates have maces?" That seemed a little weird.

"Naw, but pirates ain't the only things we fight. Anyway, once we get this stuff picked up it'll be time for dinner and your first taste of Stumble Stew. Then we'll find someplace for you to sleep and put your stuff away. At the mention of food, my stomach suddenly remembered it hadn't been fed in way too long and let out a long grumble over the fact. Red looked down at it and then up at my face which was busy blushing in embarrassment and shame. He shook his head. "You worry too much about _that_. Besides once you taste the stew you'll probably lose a bunch of it."

"I heard that," a voice from somewhere accused.


	6. Chapter 6

Putting the weaponry away, which mostly consisted of dumping it into a large box in a cubby off the common room, didn't take very long since everyone was helping. Somewhere along the way I came across a wooden sword that I put with the club and the Viking helmet. Just because. One thing I did notice while helping to put the stuff away was that it was getting a little easier for me to spring from the common room floor to the area where my trapdoor was. I don't know if it was because of the pixie dust I'd been sprinkled with, but it was obvious even to me that it was getting easier to get up there. It was still a major hassle to pull myself through the trapdoor, since I was lifting all my weight through it, but it was definitely a start.

After the last item has been put away, there was a rush for the table. The two benches were the first things occupied and then the chairs. I ended up with a stool that had three long legs and one short one. It made for a nice rocking motion as well as a noise that I imagined could become very annoying very quickly under the right circumstances. I grinned to myself as I filed that fact away.

Scattered across the tabletop were a bunch of things that looked like they were supposed to contain stew. In fact a few of them had stew still in them with a bunch of interesting furry green things floating on top of the liquid. There were gourds hacked in half, a couple of clay-looking bowls that looked as though they'd gone through various accidents with large, immovable objects, two or three coconut half-husks, and what looked to be a metal mixing bowl. "Don't use that one," Red said as he pointed to the metal bowl. "It'll burn your fingers." Everyone was looking at Leo with expectant faces and I wondered what we were waiting for.

"Whose turn is it to say grace?" Leo asked.

There was a lot of babbling and finger counting and a couple of games of "Rock, Paper, Scissors" going on. I had to admit to being a little surprised that Lost Boys said grace. It wasn't in anything I'd ever seen or read, but then I was becoming aware of the fact that while a lot had been written about our captain Peter Pan, there was very little written or seemingly known when it came to the ways of Lost Boys. Finally a decision was made. "It's Surefoot's turn to say grace."

"Aw, is not. I said it a couple days ago. What about Red? When's the last time he said it?"

"I said it yesterday before tomorrow," Red protested. "Just go ahead and say it and get it over with."

Surefoot looked unconvinced and the brightened. "How about Cubby? I'm positive he's never said it. At least here he hasn't."

Before I could say anything, Red spoke up again. "He can't say it. He'd probably screw it up." I started to complain, but Red cut me off. "You gotta remember he doesn't know it yet. He might accidentally say some weird version that doesn't fit and then we wouldn't be able to eat at all 'til tomorrow." I figured that kind of made sense, although I didn't know how weird an Anglican Church version could be. I sat back as the discussions continued, absently rocking my stool back and forth.

"Fine, fine, fine. I'll go ahead and say it. I still think someone's getting away with not saying it, and you know _someone_ keeps track of this stuff and nothing you say is going to let you get away with it."

I started to bow my head, but noticed that everyone else was just looking at Surefoot. Not quite sure what was going on, I did the same. He took a deep breath, looked around the table, and yelled "Grace!"

I looked at Red in disbelief, or at least tried to. Everyone had grabbed a bowl, gourd, or whatever and had run to the fire where they were busy dipping whatever they'd grabbed into the stewpot and then returning to their place at the table. I grabbed a gourd that didn't look too dirty and followed what the others were doing. By the time I got back, everyone else was slowly eating. That seemed a little weird since everyone had been in such a hurry to get it in the first place. Eating consisted of putting the bowl to your mouth and tilting. It was just like how I ate cereal, or used to be. I blew on my stew to cool it and waited until Red was between bites before asking him my latest question. "What was all that about 'grace' anyway? Was that cuz I'm new and it was a joke or something?"

"Nope. We say grace before every dinner. Not lunch or breakfast. Sometimes we don't even eat lunch or breakfast. At least not here. It's stew too. But before every dinner, one of us says grace."

"How come?"

He shrugged. "I dunno. It's just one of those things we're supposed to do. It's always been done that way. That's what Peter says and he keeps track of it even when he ain't here."

It was something of a relief to know that when Surefoot had said someone was keeping track, it wasn't a divine entity who was going to take us to task. Still, I had a feeling if you got on the wrong side of Peter you might wish it was a divine entity that was upset with you instead.

"How come you haven't tried your stew yet?" Tig asked with a mischievous grin.

"I'm just letting it cool," I said, blowing on it in an exaggerated manner. I took my first good look at it. The stew itself was a sort of grayish-blue colour which was a little scary since I couldn't remember ever seeing that colour before. It had what looked like carrots in it except they were bright green. Whatever it was that looked like potatoes was white. Not a cream or an off-white but brand-new-piece-of-paper white. I was certain that if I'd taken it someplace dark, I'd have know where it was from the glow of the kind-of-potatoes. There was something that looked like green beans which immediately made me suspicious because they were both green and bean shaped. Then there was what I guessed was the beef. Meat was probably a better word because I'd never seen beef that was in twists and curlicues before. It didn't look like it was any colour at all. Not that it was clear, but it seemed to shift colours as I moved the bowl or stared at it. "What kind of meat is this?" I whispered to Red. It wasn't soft enough because there was a lot of chuckling over that.

"That is whatever Surefoot, Leo and Tigger have come up with for the stew pot," Red told me. "We kinda figure it's best if only they know what it is. They promise that whatever it is didn't use to be a pirate, Indian, elf, dwarf, or any other thing like that. Everything else is fair game. I'm not even sure Stumble knows what it is."

"Course I know what it is. Ain't I the one who has to fix it? It'd be pretty stupid if I didn't know what was in it." I looked over at Tigger who made a tiny shake of his head with a grin which let me know Stumble had no clue what was in it either.

I've never been one who was shy when it came to food, obviously, and past circumstances meant I'd eaten some very dodgy things before. I even liked stew for the most part. Still, there was something about this that didn't bode well. None of the other boys were lapping it up, although they were eating it in a fashion. My gourd had a small crack in the side and the broth, gravy or whatever was slowly dripping out, but not fast enough that I'd be able to avoid sampling it. I lifted it to my nose and took a whiff. It wasn't a bad smell, it just was one I'd never come across before. It was like someone had mixed something really spicy and really sweet together. It'd have probably made me hurl if I'd smelled one by itself, but together they kinda cancelled each other out.

"C'mon Cubby. Yur not a real Lost Boy until you taste the stew. Even if ya never eat it again you have to try it once." I didn't really believe Roo that being a Lost Boy had anything to do with what you ate, but I didn't want to take any chances.

"Is there something to drink?" I asked with sudden inspiration. Like every other kid anywhere, I knew that if you had something to wash down things that might have an interesting taste, you might end up not tasting it at all.

"There's some goat milk somewhere," Stumble allowed. "If you want any you have to strain the lumps out. It's been here a pretty long time."

I almost gagged just at the thought of hot spoiled milk to wash stew down with. I decided there was no way out. I picked up the gourd in one hand, closed my nose with the other and closed my eyes. I let some dribble in my mouth and swallowed. The liquid didn't really taste like anything. The vegetables tasted kind of like dirt or mud but just a little. I thought I'd kept my teeth close together enough to prevent it, but somehow a piece of meat found its way into my mouth with the vegetables. I guess it could have been skunk. I carefully placed the gourd back on the table, made a big deal out of wiping my mouth with my sleeve and told everyone I was full.

"Full?" Stumble squawked. "What do ya mean full? You look like you could drain the whole pot if you wanted to. You trying to say there's something wrong with this?"

"No, it was good. I guess all that flying made me not hungry." I put on my most innocent expression. Stumble looked at me with his most suspicious expression trying to decide if I was lying to him or not.

"He's gotta like it," Tigger crowed. "Isn't that what it means when someone starts to turn green after they eat your stew?"

Stumble turned so red I thought he was getting ready to keel over or something. Roo didn't seem overly alarmed by it, but Leo was glaring at his brother. Stumble picked up a small gourd, dipped it in his stew gourd and hurled the contents towards Tigger. Unsurprisingly Tigger ducked and Red ended up with a pelt full of stew. "Hey, he said it. Not me." In an instant Red hurled his own stew towards Stumble who got a lot of it full in the face. The part that didn't get him ended up all over Leo's arm. There was a roar from both Stumble and Leo, but it wasn't one of rage or anger, it sounded like the way I'd felt when I'd first seen the Island below me. I noticed a huge grin on Stumble's face which seemed weird after he had looked so angry.

In no time, stew was flying all over the place. When the stew at the table ran out, the fight moved to the stewpot where gourds were dipped into the stew and flung at any available target. I sort of hung back until I got caught in the face with some. I didn't see who did it, so I just started aiming at everyone. Red was standing in front of a pallet of bedding and I whipped a bowl full of stew at him getting both him and the bedding covered. It didn't take long before the pot was empty and everyone was standing around wiping stew off their faces and out of their eyes. Stew covered the floor between the table and the fireplace and a lot of it had managed to get out into the common room as well but none of it had hit any of the hammocks or bedding except the one I'd sprayed when I hit Red.

"Gross, this place is a mess. It's going to take forever to clean it," Roo said looking around.

"Better not let Peter hear you say that. It sounded awfully grown up." Roo stuck his tongue out. "Anyway, it don't matter. It's supposed to rain tomorrow so we can just leave the trapdoors open. That'll wash most of it out." Surefoot grinned. "Good thing too. That way we won't find it in the stewpot again." Before I knew what was happening, Surefoot pulled me in front of him just as a bunch of stinky white liquid arrived to cover me. Stumble had given me the goat's milk after all.

"Sorry," Stumble said. "I couldn't stop in time."

"That's okay," I told him. I didn't want them to think I didn't belong or anything. Plus it was kind of funny if you thought about it so hard that you forgot the fact you stank. I had a feeling this was going to mean another trip to the swimming hole. "I'm sorry I got your bed all messed up," I told Red.

"No worries. I'm sure it won't bother me. I forgive you."

"Course he forgives you," Leo popped up. "He forgives you a lot cuz it's not his bed, it's yours. He sleeps over there by that big box." He pointed over to a tangle of blankets and fur.

Red laughed. "Don't worry. I'll help you get it right." He looked at me and made a face. "You too. That milk stinks almost as bad as that box of stinky stuff you stepped into earlier today. We each took a bundle of my bed stuff through our trapdoors and carried them to the swimming hole. It was beginning to get dark and there was a lot of weird sounds coming through the woods. Not that I'd have known what normal sounds were, but to a city boy everything sounded strange. This time around there weren't any pirates and we got the stew scrubbed out of the bedding pretty quick. After we were done, Red had me spread them out on the ground and he sprinkled something on them.

"So what's that do? Make it so they fly and we don't have to carry them back?"

"Naw. Pixie dust just ain't for flying. You can do all sorts of stuff with it. Just don't eat it. Here, watch." As he finished sprinkling the pixie dust on them, the bedding began to steam. In a few minutes it was just a little damp.

"Awesome," I announced. I started to pick up the stuff when Red asked me if I hadn't forgotten something. "What?" I said as I looked around.

"You still stink. Your turn."

I thought about objecting, but the milk was beginning to make my hair itch. With a sigh I jumped in the water and splashed around getting rid of the stew and the milk from my pelt and my scalp. "Two baths in one day just don't seem fair," I grumbled. I climbed out after I figured most of the stuff had been washed away. Pixie dust apparently wasn't good for drying pelts or those in them. I picked up my half of the blankets and followed Red back to Hangman's Tree, my pawmocs making squishing noises with each step.

By this time it was dark and I had a little trouble following Red. The noises from the woods had increased, but by now the familiar song of crickets and bullfrogs had been added. "This is pretty cool."

"Aren't you 'fraid of the dark?" Red asked. It was asked in a tone of curiosity rather than trying to taunt.

"Not here," I said. "This is a friendly sort of dark."

I almost ran into him as he stopped and looked back at me. "How can you tell it's friendly? I didn't know there was a difference."

"That's easy. If the dark hides me as well as it hides whatever's after me, then it's a friendly dark. If it doesn't,. like the dark in the 'real' world sometimes does, then it's not a friendly dark."

Red stood there for a moment as though trying to find a mistake in my thinking. "Huh. I guess that kinda makes sense. You'll have to tell Roo about it so he can tell whoever needs to know. I guess all of us are scared of the dark sometimes."

I shrugged, even though I knew he couldn't see me. "That's okay, I'm scared of everything else pretty much."

"That'll change."

I wasn't sure what he meant by that and didn't think I wanted to know at the moment. By the time we got back to the Tree, the rest of the boys were in a circle around the fireplace trying to scare each other with ghost stories. A lot of the floor was still covered by stew, but I finally found a place that was clean under the common room table. I put all my stuff out and then flopped down on top of it just for a moment. I listened to Leo start to tell a story about a troll skeleton that had come to life and chased him into the apple orchard. It was probably pretty scary, but before I could decide whether it was or not, I'd fallen asleep.


	7. Chapter 7

The night passed pretty much uneventfully. I remember some weird dreams about flying, pirates and trying to figure out how to use a sword. I couldn't remember what happened in any of them except for the fact that Red had to tell me over and over which end of the sword I should be using. When I woke up the next morning I tried to stand up. Okay, granted I'm not the most coordinated person in the world, in fact I could probably make a run at being most un-coordinated, but even I can usually manage to stand up with little problem. This time I'd forgotten that I'd gone to sleep under the common room table. My head hit the bottom of the table as I tried to stand up and there were suddenly stars dancing in front of my eyes along with a couple of other things I didn't recognize and some pixie dust looking stuff. My next attempt was better cuz I crawled out from under the table before trying to stand up. As I stood there rubbing the new lump on my head, I saw that I was the only one in the common room. I looked for something for breakfast but only found the stewpot, refilled, bubbling away on the edge of the fire. No way was I that hungry yet.

Jumping as high as I could, I almost managed to grab the sill of my trapdoor. On my third failed attempt I shouted in exasperation. There was a jangling sound as a small curtain two-thirds up one of the walls was pulled aside to reveal a tiny doorway. I caught my breath as I saw who could only be Tinker Bell sticking her head out to see what all the racket was about. "Uh, hi. You must be Tinker Bell. I'm Cubby."

She flew from the curtained doorway and hovered in front of my face so closely that my eyes crossed as I tried to focus on her. She didn't look real thrilled to see me and stared at me with equal measures of distrust and suspicion. She flew to the top of my head and I bellowed an "Ouch!" as she grabbed a hank of my hair and tugged. "What'd ya do that for?" I asked, rubbing my head and bellowing again as I brushed against the lump I'd gotten from hitting the table. She thought this was terrifically funny and doubled over in the air above me as she laughed hysterically. For a moment I thought she was going to fall, but she managed to recover before crashing into my upturned face. She hovered for another minute or two while she considered me and then shook her head as if finding me wanting for some reason. She threw some pixie dust at me, crossed her eyes, made a face and stuck her tongue out at me before flying back to the doorway in the wall. I noticed that she had a bunch of red hair in one of her hands, which started my head to throbbing a bit worse. I hadn't even know it was possible to slam a door made of cloth before she completed the task.

After Tinker Bell's sprinkling of pixie dust I was able to grab the sill of my trapdoor with a lot less trouble and managed to haul myself through. I squeezed through the tunnel and popped through the outer trap door, managing to tumble out of the tree and landed at Red's feet. "I wondered if you were going to get up today. The whole table was shaking the way you were snoring. Roo thought we were having an earthquake or something. You have breakfast yet?" I shook my head no which caused him to laugh. "Yeah, it takes awhile. "Don't worry, I got your back. Follow me."

He led me away from the Tree and through an area of brush and plants, dust rising up from the ground where we stepped. We crossed a couple of streams and irritated a beaver who slapped it's tail at us. Eventually we came to a place that looked like an explosion of brambles and thorns had taken place. In the middle of it all were tons of blackberries. I'd have preferred blueberries, but I certainly wasn't going to be picky. For the next several minutes the only sound that could be heard above the singing of the birds was the munching of blackberries. By the time we were finished, we both had stained mouths and hands. Somehow the front of my bear pelt was also stained, but Red's fox pelt hadn't gotten a drop on it.

"That was really good," I said, examining my fingers to make sure there wasn't any juice left on them that needed to be removed.

"Yeah, I sort of gathered you liked them the way you stripped that branch." He looked up at the sky and muttered something. "We gotta hurry. Leo and Tig are waiting for us." He headed back the way we'd come at a quick walk.

"What're we going to do?" I asked as I tried to keep up with his walk. Not only was he walking fast, but his legs were longer so he covered more ground in a sep than I did.

"We're going to set up an ambush with Leo and Tig cuz it's our turn to. Not you and me, but us Lost Boys. Leo and Tig are supposed to be covering a big hole we dug awhile back with some leaves and stuff and then we're going to bait the trap and instant ambush. It'll be cool. Last time I think we got four at once. We didn't use the pit then. I think we used an invisible rock or something. I wish we could find where Surefoot had left it."

"Wait… a second. What… do you… mean by am… bush?" It was difficult for me to talk since the direction Red took was uphill and I was trying to breathe and ignore the stitch in my side. "What… do we do… with… the… pirates when we… catch them?"

"Pirates? I didn't mention pirates."

Instead of answering him, I staggered to the top of the hill where he'd stopped to wait for me. I stood there for a moment, bent over with my hands on my knees, to catch the breath that had abandoned me for places where there were no hills anywhere. I finally caught at least part of it and then stretched to attempt to pop the stitch. "You said we were going to set up an ambush," I finally managed to get out. "Don't that mean pirates?"

Red shook his head. "No way. You aren't quite ready for a pirate battle yet. I'll explain it all later, but we gotta move so we won't get there too late." He started up the hill.

I began to follow him when I suddenly realized that we'd been at the top of a hill. It should have been impossible for us to be headed uphill again. No just impossible, but horribly unfair as well. "What do I do when we get there?" I panted out.

He turned around and gave me a huge grin that I'd come to find out was a major warning sign. "You're lucky Cub. You got the easy part. All you have to do is relax and be the bait.

I didn't have enough breath to ask about that at the moment, so instead I watched one foot appear and the other disappear as I continued to stagger up the hill behind Red. I did have enough breath for tons of questions and scenarios pop through my mind. Even though I'd been assured it wasn't a pirate ambush, there were tons of other things I imagined fighting with. An enraged dragon. Some sort of rabid unicorn. The crocodile. An image of a twelve foot rat with sharpened fangs even made its way through my mind as I continued to ponder on being bait.

All that thinking and worrying is probably why when I noticed the loop of vine in the path, I calmly watched as my left foot planted itself right in the middle of it. There was a very big 'twang' and I suddenly found myself looking at the world both upside down and from about eight feet from the ground. "Red," I yelled. "I'm caught."

Red turned around and rushed back to where I was hanging upside down. "That's not supposed to happen. It's _our_ turn, not their's. What are they thinking?"

"What is who thinking?"

"Never mind. There's no time right now. I could probably climb up and cut you down, but… Hang on a sec. Be quiet and listen." I listened but could only hear the normal sounds of birds, scolding chipmunks, and a bunch of bees. "Yeah, me too," Red said when I told him what I'd heard. "That means they aren't nearby." He rubbed his hands together. "I think we can still use you as bait but they won't expect this at all. Stay here. I'll run get Tig and Leo."

"Stay here? Is that supposed to be funny or something?" I yelled at his retreating back. I tried to reach the vine that was wrapped around my ankle, but couldn't come close. All I succeeded in doing was to cause myself to start slowly rotating. The first five or six spins didn't reveal anything really new or exciting, just your typical view of the woods. As I slowly circled around again, new things appeared. There were now four smiling faces looking up at me in a way that conveyed quite nicely how glad they were to see me.

Red had been right, they weren't pirates at all. They were natives. All of them looked to be about my age with jet black hair and dark skin. They were dressed in denim cutoffs and tanned sleeveless vests and had bare feet. A couple had tomahawks and one was busy uncoiling some rope. "You're not pirates, your natives," I blurted out. They all looked at each other and rolled their eyes.

"Dude, ain't no one native to this place that looks like you and me. You're a Lost Boy and we're Indians. You can get it if you take it slowly." He finished with the rope.

"I thought you didn't like to be called Indians."

"Since I've never seen you before, I don't know how you figure that," the tallest one said.

"Aw, cut him some slack. He's gotta be new. I haven't seem him before either and I'd remember him." The shortest one turned towards me. "Some don't, some do. We do, so it's not like it's a big deal or anything." He turned back to the others. "Okay, so how do we get him down? We aren't going to have much time 'til Leo and company show up."

"I can climb up and cut him down," the rope-uncoiler said.

"Just don't expect me to catch him," the tall one said.

"Like you've ever caught anyone before, Luke. Just try to make sure he doesn't fall on his head."

The tall one nodded and started up the tree as if he was part squirrel. I'd never seen anyone move that fast before. I caught the tall one's eye. "Luke?" I asked.

"Yeah. I'm Luke. That's Seth," he pointed to towards the tree. "That's Josh." The short one nodded. That's 'One Who Goes Silent in the Night,' he pointed towards the remaining boy who hadn't said a word the entire time.

"He is not," Josh said wearily as if this wasn't the first time Luke had called him that. "That's Michael. He doesn't talk. Not because he can't but because he doesn't want to. Before he stopped talking, he said he wouldn't begin talking again until something happened."

"What?"

"Got me. He stopped talking before he shared that with us."

"I bet you're known as Galloping Bear," Luke offered. Before I had a chance to correct him, the vine attached to the tree was no longer attached to the tree. Luke stepped back as I landed in a heap on the ground. "Are you okay?" Luke asked, as he helped me up.

"Course he's okay. He's one of them, isn't he?" Seth started to tie my hands in front of me. "Sorry," he said apologetically, "it's part of the rules."

"Rules for what?"

"For ambushing Lost Boys. Once we catch you, we tie you up and take you back to our camp." He made a final knot and tugged at the rope to make sure it was tight. "Okay, he's packaged. Let's go."

We walked in single-file with Josh and Luke in front of me and Seth and Michael behind. Josh set a pretty quick pace and I struggled to keep up. We hadn't gone too far when Josh came to a stop so fast that I ran into the back of Luke causing both of us to tumble to the ground. Before anyone could say anything or move, there was the sound of yelling and screaming and the woods around us erupted with Lost Boys. There were a few brief skirmishes which looked to be more shoving, pushing and wrestling than any real battle going on. I did my share to keep Luke from getting into the battle since I was lying on top of his legs. It'd be nice to say I did it from some sort of plan on my part, but it had more to do with the way my hands were tied. In a few moments the guys who'd held me prisoner were now prisoners themselves, each one with their hands tied in front of them. Roo finished up looking at a black eye that Leo had gotten when his brother accidentally elbowed him in the face.

"I know he's new, but what'd you do to Cubby? Stab him?" Surefoot asked Luke as he stared at me. Everyone turned to look at me and I looked down at the front of the bear pelt and gave an embarrassed laugh.

"It's just blackberry juice," I explained. There was some laughter over that and a comment about ruining my appetite.

"Give up?" Leo asked Josh when the laughter had died out.

Josh looked around and shrugged. "You win this time," he said with a grin. "I don't know that it's fair to leave the new kid as bait, but we should have figured it was too easy."

"Naw, it wasn't. He really is that clumsy," Red said as he cut the rope binding my hands and then went to each of the others and cut theirs.

"Hey," I objected.

"Don't worry, Galloping Bear. Ask me sometime to tell you how clumsy he was," Seth said as he rubbed his wrists. "The stuff Red accomplished with his clumsiness will be told of for a long, long time after he's gone on to the next adventure."

"Galloping Bear, huh? Yeah, I can see that," Tig said with a smirk that let me know it wouldn't soon be forgotten either.

"You won't make us take you to the Tree to count this as a win, will you?" Leo asked Josh. "If you don't then we can hit the swimming hole."

Josh thought it over. A convenient cloud of gnats helped him decide. Right after they descended upon our groups, Josh and Leo declared a truce and let us with a lot of whooping and hollering to the swimming hole. There I discovered that Lost Boys really did swim in their pelts. "They get kinda gross if we don't," Stumble confided to me. I also discovered that bees get very, very irritated if you sit on them.

The rest of the day was spent swimming and going into the woods to forage for lunch and dinner. It was a good break from stew. Luke got a small fire going and Tigger almost had me convinced that a certain beetle tasted just like s'mores if you roasted it over the fire. I'd have fallen for it if I hadn't noticed that every Lost Boy and Indian was concentrated way to much on the discussion.

By the time I fell asleep on the shore of the swimming hole, I was sunburned, a little hungry, bee-stung, and had a multitude of insect bites that kept itching. I realized I'd never been happier.


	8. Chapter 8: My First Pirate Battle

I'd been a Lost Boy for about a month by now and had learned a few things. I'd had my first Indian battle and a couple of skirmishes with pirates. I'd learned how to forage for stuff that washed up on shore during the storms that came fairly often and the best place to go swimming in the Little Bear River. There were places to explore and treasure to find. I was the butt of jokes and pulled a few of my own. Neverland seemed to be the closest thing possible to paradise until early one morning.

"C'mon," I whispered to myself. "Just a few more inches." I slowly snake-crawled under the bush that was nothing but briars and stretched my hand out towards a blueberry that was the size of a tangerine. I wasn't drooling… yet. As my hand brushed the berry there was a sudden rolling and shaking of the ground and the dream dissolved into a million pieces. Before I could do anything about it, my eyes opened to see Red staring down at me with an expression I'd never seen before. "What's wrong?" I asked, suddenly scared of something.

"You need to get up," he said in a subdued voice, glancing over his shoulder. I followed his look to see Pan sitting on his throne looking deep in thought. Pan's eyes flickered up for a moment and caught mine causing me to shiver. He went back to brooding.

"What's wrong?" I whispered, looking around. The rest of the boys were up and busy strapping on swords, cutlasses, and other sharp, piercing items. Even Stumble and Roo were getting ready for what looked like major battle. "Red? What's going on?" I wasn't sure what was worse, the fact that everyone looked as though they were getting ready to fight for their lives or the fact that everyone looked so grim and there was no cutting up going on. I hadn't been on the island for a real long time, but there had been a few times when things had gotten bad for one reason or another. The worst things got, the more the jokes and the cutting up increased. I'd gotten to the point where I was pretty sure if I was every put in Lost Boys' Field, there'd be laughter and jokes while they did it. Something I would heartily agree with. Of course I never had to worry about that. Everyone knew Lost Boys didn't die. It just didn't happen no matter what the field might seem to say.

"Pirate fight," Red mumbled. He gestured at me to get me moving out of my pallet.

"What happened?" I got up and looked around re-confirming that all us Lost Boys were accounted for. I'd figured that maybe someone had gotten caught in an ambush or something but no one was missing. "Is Tink okay?"

He gave me one of his 'are you crazy looks. "Course she's okay. Why wouldn't she be? Anyway we have to get you a weapon or two. A sword and maybe a dagger or something else."

"Me? Are you crazy? Don't you remember what Leo and Surefoot said about me being better off throwing it at someone because I can't use it worth anything? I'd be more likely to stab me or another Lost Boy than a pirate."

"So you're bailing then? Is that it?"

"Wha…? No. Of course not." I looked around to see all the others staring at us with the exception of Peter who seemed to have vanished. Somewhere a clod of dirt fell from the ceiling and sounded like an explosion when it hit the floor because of the silence. I opened my mouth to say something, hesitated, and then let the words come tumbling out over each other. "I know I'm a coward and craven and I'm scared to death right now but that doesn't mean I'd ever dessert you cuz I know what that's like." The words had started out low but I was steadily approaching yelling. "I know I ain't much of a Lost Boy cuz I'm big and clumsy and all that other stuff but I'm still a Lost Boy and nothing is going to change that and I don't want anything to change that even if I have to fight pirates which I don't want to do." I was forced to stop and catch my breath since I hadn't bothered with any periods or commas.

"I didn't mean it like that," Red said, looking down at his feet. "I know you'll fight and all that. It's just..." He went from looking at his feet to considering the ceiling and then shrugged as he looked back at me. "Aw, everything will work out like it's 'posed to."

I'd heard better reassurances before, but that was okay. At least it made me feel as though I fit in a little more. An important feeling considering what was getting ready to happen. Suddenly Leo and Surefoot were standing in front of me. "You'll have your club with you," Leo said. He handed me a cutlass that seemed way too big and way too heavy. "Take this along with the scabbard. Here's a dagger, and check in that chest for anything else." He raised his voice. "Time to go guys, meet ya outside."

I strapped on the scabbard, which didn't fit very well, and tried a few swings with the cutlass. I'm not sure how, but I ended up with a shallow cut on my arm and a new slice out of the bear pelt. I dropped it on the floor, stuffed the sheathed dagger in a pocket and went over to the chest. Inside it was a bunch of odds and ends. I pulled out a slingshot and crammed it in another pocket. A quick dig also revealed a wooden sword. I pulled it out and looked at it. It'd seen a lot of use and I was pretty sure it wouldn't work real well against a steel sword but it fit well in my hand and there was something that told me I should take it. It was very loose in the scabbard, but I didn't think it would bounce out before I had to use it. I climbed up through my trap door, instruments of doom rattling or knocking against the side of my tunnel, and emerged out into the chilly darkness of early morning. Eddies of mist moved around Hangman's Tree and the surrounding area giving the Lost Boys a ghostly appearance as they stood huddled next to the tree. Leo stood a little bit away from the group listening to Peter. I couldn't hear what was being said, but even in the filmy darkness I could see Leo frowning.

In a little bit we started off towards Pirate's Cove. Peter flew above the trees and quickly disappeared from sight. I found myself trudging along next to Tigger. For once it didn't seem like we were going uphill constantly and I could actually find the breath to talk. "Do the pirates have treasure or did they capture someone?"

I halfway expected some sort of sarcastic answer, but even Tigger was very subdued. "We haven't fought in awhile and it's time to. Peter and Hook have to fight because… well because they hate each other and it keeps some sort of balance. Hook hates us Lost Boys a ton too."

"Balance? Balance of what?" Tigger just looked at me sorrowfully and gave a half shrug. It was impossible to tell if he didn't know or just didn't want to tell what he did know. Either possibility was equally probable. "Well then why's he hate Lost Boys so much? Cuz Peter is our captain and we fight with him?" It seemed like a logical reason, but I wasn't sure why Tig had mentioned it.

"There's a reason for it, but now's not the time to be asking about it. When we get back ask Red about it. He knows. Heck we all know except you, really. Someone should have told you 'bout it before, but it won't make a lot of difference in the battle."

We continued moving through the woods without any of the familiar talk or laughter that I was used to. Even though no one was talking, we weren't exactly moving with stealth either. Anyone who wasn't completely deaf would have been able to tell we were passing by. I chanced another question to Tigger. "Shouldn't we be trying to sneak up on the pirates?"

"Wouldn't be no point to it. They know we're coming."

"What?" I said it quietly but it was still loud enough that everyone could hear it. "If they know we're coming, then why don't we just not show up?" The skirmishes between Lost Boy and pirate that had occurred since I'd been on the island had happened when one group surprised the other. They were normally short, brutal things. I'd helped Roo sew up a couple of gashes received during them, but no one had died in one.

"Cubby, I'm truly surprised you'd say such a thing," a voice said from above. I looked up to see Peter drifting above me. "What kind of message would that give Hook about my bravery? Even as big a coward as you should be able to figure that out." He gave me a grin that didn't do much to take the sting out of his words and then crowed so loudly that the echo called back for a long time. A wolf howled in response from far away.

We completed the rest of the trip to Pirate's Cove without any conversation. The trail dumped us out on the beach from where we could see The Jolly Roger hove to in the lagoon. Not a sound came from the ship and the only thing that could be seen on it were a couple of lanterns. For a moment I wondered if we'd ended up with the element of surprise after all, until Surefoot pointed out the two rowboats that had been left for us.

Red grabbed me by the arm and pulled me aside. "Listen up, Furball. When this happens, don't think too much. All you want to do is use your sword to block whatever someone's swinging at you trying to kill you. Don't worry 'bout trying to hurt anyone, the rest of us'll take care of that. You got a lot more to learn before you start trying that. Oh and make sure if ya do swing at anyone that you make sure they're not wearing a pelt. Everyone else is fair game. Don't go near Hook, he's Peter's, and if you suddenly find yourself fighting a pirate wearing a purple medallion who's thin as a skeleton, stay with him. He won't hurt you too much."

"Really? Why?"

"He's Sorrowful Saul and wanted to be a Lost Boy instead of a pirate."

I looked at Red in surprise. "How do you know that?"

"Don't worry about it, Furball. Just pay attention and use this the way you need to, not the way you want to," he said pulling my sword out of the scabbard. This time it was his turn to look surprised. "How'd you end up with this? It's wood." He handed it to me.

"No joke," I said. "It's what I'm fighting with."

Red opened his mouth to say something, closed it, and nodded. "If you get hurt, I'm going to kill you after Roo kills you." He walked towards one of the rowboats and I took a look around the beach. Leo was busy talking earnestly to Tig who looked as though he was both bored and scared. Stumble and Surefoot were discussing something while pointing at various parts of the ship. Roo was swinging a sword, which just looked weird since he never fought. Everyone moved towards the rowboats as Pan flew back from taking an aerial look at the ship and shouted at us to fall in.

"Okay lads, this is it. We're going to go over there and show those pirates what Lost Boys are made of. There's going to be blood and gore but in the end they'll be the ones retreating, not me. Are you ready?" The row of Lost Boys, including myself, cheered. I'm not sure why I cheered, it wasn't an inspiring speech or anything, but suddenly what we were getting ready to do was very, very important even though I had no clue as to why. Peter looked at me and then addressed everyone again. "Be sure to keep an eye on Cubby, too. This is his first battle and he'll be the biggest target… for a lot of reasons."

There was some more talking, a couple of words of advice, and the readying of equipment. I found myself trying to help row one of the boats which was an adventure in itself. If nothing else, it did get a few chuckles, especially when I managed to brain myself with one of the oars. All too soon the side of The Jolly Roger loomed above us, a rope ladder disappearing above from where we were. "You go last, Cubby. Just in case things aren't the way they should be."

I looked down at the water moving in the bottom of the rowboat. "I'm scared," I said in a very small voice.

"It's okay, Cubbs," Stumble said as he stood in the boat to start up the ladder. "All of us are too and so's every member of Hook's crew right now. Ain't no one knows if this is the time or not." He swarmed up the ladder in an instant, belying his name, before I could say a word. I followed as quickly as I could, which wasn't real fast. Between the ladder being slippery and me being clumsy, I lost my footing a couple of times. Still, by the time I got to the deck, nothing had happened yet. The rest of the boys were in a loose, semi-circle around where the ladder was. Of pirates, there was no sign. I looked around the deck and felt weak when I saw what could only be the 'plank' on the opposite side of the ship from where we were, jutting out over the water.

A door slammed open somewhere on a deck above us and a vision in red suddenly appeared. I've read a lot of descriptions about Captain Jas. Hook and everyone of them captured the man in front of us perfectly. At the same time, none of them came close. Hook was wearing a scarlet coat with a white, ruffled shirt beneath it. He wore a matching crimson hat with a pure white feather stuck in it that on anyone else would have caused snickering. He made the hat look like a thing of danger and foreboding. Beneath the hat flowed thick, black hair that had been tied in the back. It seemed to shimmer as it moved which was impossible because there was no light, save for the lanterns, for it to shimmer from. There was an ornate sword strapped to his left side and a pair of pistols on either side of his chest. For a moment I thought it horribly unfair that he had pistols and we didn't and wondered why he had two since he obviously couldn't use one with the hook. The hook which was shining and sparkling like a newly minted star, also impossible given the lack of light but happening nonetheless, was a thing of horrific beauty. It looked like a piece of jewelry and a viper all in one. I couldn't take my eyes off of it, the way it moved and danced as he moved his arm. I'd still be looking at it if one of the other boys hadn't given me a whack on the back of my head breaking my concentration on it. My eyes found Hook's face.

Coward that I am, I can confidently say that I didn't know the true meaning of the word fear until I looked at Hook's face. There wasn't anything extraordinarily horrible about it as far as general looks went. He only had two eyes, a nose and a mouth that wasn't full of fangs. He didn't have any tattoos or a beard braided with ribbon and full of lit candles. What he did have was the eyes and the smile. His eyes brushed mine and I knew that he knew everything about me. Especially the fact that I was a coward, why I'd run away from the 'real' world, even the reason that I was the biggest Lost Boy. Nothing could hide from those eyes which would always be able to see the truth, no matter how much it was concealed. I managed to feel as though I'd horribly disappointed this man and was so concerned about that fact that I even tried to suck in my stomach so I wouldn't look as fat. For a brief instant it was the most important thing in the world that I earn this person's approval even as I knew that he loathed, hated and despised me and would like nothing more than to un-create me. As bad as the eyes were, the smile was worse. It conveyed things that it shouldn't have been able to. It let you know that he knew everything about you, that he wanted to be your best friend, and that he would kill you without thought and compunction. Unlike the smile that says 'my killing you would sadden me but is necessary,' Hook's smile said that the only thing he'd hate is the fact that he couldn't torment you long enough before your life slipped away.

A crowing from above had everyone turn to see Pan floating by one of the masts. "About time you showed up Hook. I was beginning to think you'd turned coward on us. Something that wouldn't be surprising about an old codfish like you."

Hook tensed for a moment and then gave a mocking bow towards where Peter was floating. "Nice try, boy, but your insults won't stand up to finely honed steel. The true coward is he who won't fight his betters one-on-one but relies on a bunch of babes to have their blood be spilled for him while he floats through the air watching." There was some muttering at being called babes, but no one moved a muscle.

"Call me a coward, will you?" Peter demanded, his face flushed almost as red as his hair. "No grown-up gets away with that, especially one without two-hands." The muttering turned to cheers.

"Grow up, boy. The truth stings, doesn't it." He looked down at us Lost Boys as though he smelled something disagreeable. "Face it boy, this is between you and me. There's no need to bring others into our… disagreement when you and I can finish it once and for all right now." Hook gave what he must have thought was a sincere look but which caused another lump of ice to form in my stomach. "I'll let every brat of yours leave my ship and promise never to seek them out again, win or lose, if you agree to fight me right now. Just you and me, feet on the deck, sword-to-sword. A very fitting and honorable deal that you should take. That is unless you're truly the coward I know ye to be."

Peter looked as though he was going to lose it. His face managed to get even redder and his hands were clenched into white fists. He looked the exact same way someone I was familiar with in the 'real' world looked before they had thrashed me because of their mindless anger. This time it wasn't me I was scared for, it was Peter. The one who'd rescued me. The captain of the Lost Boys. The heart of Neverland. The one who was so angry that I knew he would agree with the deal even though I knew that same anger would cause him to lose.

I dug into my pocket and pulled out the slingshot. From another pocket I dug out a marble and loaded it into the cup of the slingshot. I was moving as fast as I could, but everything was happening so slowly. I heard the sound of my bear pelt shift and the sound of the elastic of the slingshot stretch as I pulled the cup back. I took careful aim and released the marble. The elastic made a twang sound and I heard the air being displaced as the marble cut through it. There was a soft, pulpy smacking sound as the marble hit Hook's forehead, causing the Captain to stagger back a step and bringing action back up to speed and my hearing ability back down to normal. One or two of the other boys gasped as Peter looked towards us and grinned, his anger suddenly forgotten.

"Who dares show such bad form?" Hook roared, the question coming back a half dozen times from the hills. "Speak up. Who was the coward who dared launch an attack during a parlay?" He looked at me and I knew without doubt he now knew where the marble had come from, even if I hadn't still been holding the slingshot in plain sight. "Liars! Cheaters! Very well, a pox on all of you. Mr. Smee, turn out the crew. I gave you snot-nosed brats an honorable chance and you pay me back with a dishonorable attack."

Hook stomped on the deck twice with his boot. From fore and aft hatches slammed open with pirates boiling out of them. Both Lost Boys and pirates let out howls and started towards each other. I managed to get my feet moving but was very glad it was still dark enough that no one could see what I left behind.

There might have been some sort of plan or reason to the attack made by the pirates or us Lost Boys but no one had bothered to tell me about it and it sure didn't look like one existed on either side. I followed the other Lost Boys as they ran towards the pirates coming towards us. Some part of my mind was trying to get my attention to let me know that a battle against a million pirates couldn't possibly be won by Pan and seven Lost Boys. I tried to ignore it as best I could and swung my wooden sword in wild circles as I was approached by a pirate who looked as though he'd carve me up without a second thought. His yellow teeth were bared in a maniacal grin in a face covered with tattoos of strange mystical signs. The cutlass he held in his hand didn't waver at all as he got within striking distance of me. "Death be yours," he said in a whisper that surprisingly I was able to hear over the roar around me.

The pirate negligently swung his cutlass towards my neck. I screwed my eyes shut, swung my wooden sword towards where I thought his cutlass might be, and waited to feel a sharp pain. The pain blossomed, but nowhere near where I'd expected. My right hand burned as the wooden sword it was holding apparently stopped the pirate's cutlass from beheading me. I opened my eyes to see a huge gouge in my sword and the pirate getting ready to take another swing. I closed my eyes again and swung the wooden sword as hard as I could. At the same time I felt a pain in my right side I heard a wet, smacking sound and a gasp as there was another jolt to my right hand. I opened my eyes again and saw the pirate writhing on the deck. There was a very large bruise forming above his left eye with blood coming from it.

I stood there in shock for a moment and then dropped to my knees next to him. "Are... are you okay?" I stammered. Around me the sounds of battle raged and from somewhere I heard Pan crowing. I realized I was still holding the wooden sword in my right hand and threw it from me as though it was burning my hand. "C'mon, you gotta be okay," I begged, as I tried to wipe some off the blood off his face with my hand. All I succeeded in doing was smearing it. I started digging through my pocket for a rag or cloth or something that I could use to wipe his face when I started shaking so hard I couldn't see. This man had tried to kill me even though I hadn't done anything to him. There was no way I could even begin to try and figure that out. I knew they were pirates and we were Lost Boys and we were supposed to be trying to kill each other, but … I shook even more violently and puked on the deck. I started crawling to where I'd thrown the wooden sword when there was a triumphant yell behind me. I looked back to see another pirate running towards me swinging a spar. This time I froze so badly I couldn't even close my eyes. I couldn't think of anything as I watched the pirate get larger than life. He got within a couple of paces when his left foot went flying after it slipped in the recycled stew I'd left behind. I watched in confusion as the pirate went flying and landed on his back, his head hitting a cannon.

I stood up unsteadily and looked around, giving up on the wooden sword. It was then I found out how a handful of Lost Boys could manage to stand up to a ton of pirates. Both groups fought dirty but us Lost Boys did it with a lot more imagination. I watched as Leo and Tigger managed to put a handful of pirates out of the fight by simply bowling them down with cannonballs. Stumble was throwing handfuls of marbles on the deck, which were a lot more effective than recycled stew was. "Cubby, c'mere." I turned to where Red and Surefoot, standing by one of the masts, were waving me over. I went over and climbed up to where they were standing, wondering why it was hard to breathe. We were a few feet above the main deck.

"You okay, Furball?" Red asked. I nodded. "Good. I want you to grab this rope," he said handing me a rope that was attached somewhere above. "Hold on to it as tight as you can. Oh, and don't yell or anything. Ready?" Before I could say anything, Red and Surefoot grabbed me and swung me out over the deck towards a group of pirates harassing Leo and Tigger. The pirates, who were facing away from me, never knew what hit them. Tigger's pelt seemed to be missing half its tail and Leo's pelt had a few gashes in it, but neither of them looked too horribly bad and they were giving better than they were taking. I swung back to where Red and Surefoot were. I almost lost my balance and fell over, but Surefoot was nice enough to grab me by the ear and pull me back. It would have been nice if it had been one of the bear pelt's ears rather than one of my real ones, but I guess beggars can't be choosers.

The rope trick worked a couple more times before someone up above cut it loose. Whoever did it should have waited cuz when they cut it I ended up landing on top of a few more pirates. I think I was the only one who got up. By this time there weren't nearly as many pirates as there had been starting out. The hood on Surefoot's raccoon pelt seemed to be missing and Stumble was sitting next to the rail staring at nothing. I started towards Stumble to see what was wrong when Red crossed my path being chased by a pirate. Without thinking I reached back, grabbed my club and swung it into the pirate chasing Red. I don't know how hard I swung, but the pirate went down. Red looked back at me with a shocked expression that turned into a grin. I was beginning to feel the way that Stumble looked.

There was a lot of other things that happened but I don't remember much of it. I still couldn't figure out why people I didn't even know wanted to kill me. I do remember blocking a lot of cutlass and sword thrusts with the club and wondered towards the end how it got so heavy. I felt like I could barely lift it. Then suddenly every Lost Boy was going over the side where we'd arrived in the boats. I hadn't seen any sign or signal, but followed and took Stumble's feet as Roo grabbed his shoulders. Somehow we managed to carry him down the ladder to the rowboat without us falling or dropping him. Halfway between _The Jolly Roger_ and the shore I stuck my head over the side and tried to throw up again. I waited for the comments to begin when I was finished, but there wasn't a word said. Red patted my back in understanding. There was no sign of Pan.

When we got to the shore I looked back at the pirate ship. There didn't appear to be any activity on it and no indication of what had happened on board. I don't know if there'd been any pirates killed or not. All the Lost Boys were among the living but looked as thought they'd been in… well… a pirate fight. There was a lot of rust coloured stains on various pelts and Stumble was still staring off in space. On the beach the waves were hitting the sand, palm fronds were moving in the wind and the sound of sea gulls echoed from everywhere. "It's not fair," I said to no one in particular.

"What's not fair?"

"Everything's the same. It's normal." Leo looked at me as if I'd lost my mind. "Things should be different. I mean look at Stumble. He's just sitting there like he's lost his mind or he's getting ready to… you know, and all I can hear is seagulls screaming like nothing's happened. It's…" I stopped because I didn't know what it was. I just knew that Events had happened and it wasn't right that things should just be going on like they always did. For some reason it depressed me so much I wanted to give up.

"It's okay, Cubby," Roo said. "Stumble gets this way sometimes when he looses a little blood. He'll be okay. Promise. You think you can carry him back to the Tree?" I nodded and gently swung him over my shoulder. He wasn't as heavy as I thought he should be.

The trip back to Hangman's Tree was as subdued as the outgoing trip had been. There were a lot more twists and turns this time, which I figured was to keep any of the pirates following us back. I hadn't even known there were eight bodies of water between Pirate's Cove and Hangman's Tree. By the time we got back, I think I was more asleep than awake, but at least I hadn't dropped Stumble. I helped get him through his trapdoor and managed to squeeze through my own. All of us except Roo and Stumble were sitting around the common room table. There was a solemn air and Pan's throne at the end of the room was empty. A couple of boys were eating stew and the rest were contemplating, reliving bits of battle, or trying to forget from the expressions on their faces. I was hurting and confused and didn't understand at all.

"What happened? Did we win? Where's Peter?" I asked. I remembered being in battle even if I didn't remember everything that happened. Yet even having been part of the fight, albeit a very little part, I had no idea what the outcome was. What had been accomplished. Whether good had triumphed over evil or not.

Leo shrugged. "Pan didn't defeat Hook but then Hook didn't defeat Pan either. So no one's won or lost and things will go on the way they have been for awhile longer at least. Pan's wherever Pan goes after battle." Leo suddenly looked more weary than he could bear. "Not everything is there in the legends, you know."

Before I had an opportunity to ask anything else, Roo came into the room. He looked at each of us and then motioned to me. "C'mon Cubby, I need your help."

I slowly got out of my chair, stretched which caused the pain in my side to return, and followed him into the small area off the common room where Stumble lay. He looked asleep and his face was extremely pale. "Is he…?"

Roo glanced over at the raccoon pelted Lost Boy and then went back to digging through a box. "Yeah, he'll be okay. He caught a sword slash in his arm that needs to be stitched up." I looked and saw a slit in the arm of Stumble's pelt. "I need you to hold him down while I sew up his arm in case he wakes up. He probably won't, but you never know."

I kneeled down next to where Stumble was laying, prepared to hold him down if necessary. Roo peeled back the sleeve, revealing a short but deep oozing cut surrounded by way too much red. He quickly washed it and then started to deftly close the wound with small, neat stitches. Stumble moved a little as Roo started each stitch, but never woke. After a few minutes Roo examined his work and nodded in satisfaction. "There, that should take care of it. He'll be good as new with a few hours sleep and the rest of us might get something other than stew for half a day." Roo shook his head, causing sweat to go flying from his head. He gave me a considering look. "You're going to have to learn to do this."

"Yeah, right. You saw me in the boat and that wasn't the only time I tossed my cookies. You should be lookin' for someone with a stronger stomach."

"Nope. A weak stomach means you still believe in a few things that the others don't believe in. That can be important."

I would have asked why it was important as well as what it was that was so important if I hadn't gotten sleepy so suddenly. I said something but don't know what it was. Whatever it was, it must have been interesting because Roo gave me a really weird look and came over to where I was. "Stand up for a second." I managed to make it to my feet and stood there wondering why everything refused to stay still. "You blockhead. When did that happen?"

"What?"

"You have a huge cut in your side. Wait here, I'm going to have to get someone to hold you down." He left shaking his head and muttering about mule-headedness. I didn't think it was fair that Roo thought he needed both Leo and Tigger, especially since I don't think I flinched too badly and only yelled once. I don't think the cut was nearly as large as Roo said it was, anyway.

I fell into my pallet under the common room table trying to find a position that didn't hurt. Roo stuck his head under the table after a few minutes and asked how I was feeling. "Okay, I guess. There's stuff I'm not sure of but that doesn't count."

"Everything counts. Never forget that. You saw Hook today, right?" I nodded and wanted to throw up again. "Listen," Roo said earnestly. "There's going to be nightmares. There's always nightmares. Just… be careful. They can be weird and don't even think about… you know." His head vanished. I lay there and made pictures from the pine tar gum stuck to the bottom of the table 'til sleep took me.


	9. Chapter 9: The Apple Orchard

Within a couple of days there was nothing to show a pirate battle had ever been fought except for a couple of black eyes, some bruises, and the yelling of Stumble as Roo examined his stitches. Stumble had come back to life nicely and didn't act as though anything out of the ordinary had happened at all. Of course for all I knew nothing out of the ordinary had happened. I hoped that it'd be a long time between battles and that I'd never end up with Cap'n Hook staring at me again. Red let me know that hope probably wouldn't come to pass because he'd know I was the one to embarrass him with the marble. "Just be careful," he said when I tried to press him. "It's sort of like when you cross that messed up bridge over the Little Bear River. You don't worry about it so much that you freeze, but you don't go jumping up and down in the middle of it either and if it started to fall you'd probably do something besides just stand there." He pushed the gourd of stew away from him and made a face. The breakfast stew this morning consisted of a greenish-purple broth with something that resembled cut up banana swimming in it. Banana that tasted like bad green beans.

"If you help me clean up, I'll show you where there's something worth eating," Red whispered to me since Stumble was sitting at the opposite end of the table. He didn't look like he was enjoying his stew any better than we were and looked at Red's gourd suspiciously but didn't say anything. Chores and cleaning up were something I hadn't really expected to be part of the Lost Boy routine but I should have figured there was some non-magical reason that the common room wasn't buried in dirt and other stuff. Red told me that Tink had a lot to do with making sure that things didn't get too out of hand by using her vast knowledge of hair pulling.

It didn't take a whole lot of time to help Red clean up the accumulated gourds and stuff from the past couple of days. I had a tendency to try and get all the gunk out, but Red told me it wasn't necessary. "Most of it's covered up by new stew and probably tastes better than the new stuff anyway. A couple of weeks ago that would have concerned me but I found it made remarkable sense now. I debated between wooden sword and club and finally took the sword because it was lighter and I could stick it in the cut in the pelt so I didn't have to carry it all the time. No one was quite sure how it had returned to the common room. I was certain I'd lost it on _The Jolly Roger_ and none of the other boys remembered bringing it back.

Red and I climbed through our trapdoors to the outside of the Tree. I still had to stop and look around whenever I climbed out. The scene was so different than the one I had been used to. Trees waving in a lazy breeze, butterflies of green, yellow, blue and red, the occasional pixie zipping past on some errand. It was hard not to pinch myself to make sure I wasn't dreaming. "Where are we going?" I asked Red.

"I figured I'd show you a couple of other places you haven't been before. One of them's a place where there's something other than stew to eat."

"Blueberries?" I asked.

"You and blueberries," he said, shaking his head. "You're as bad as Roo and strawberries. Naw, none of those this time. I'm in the mood for apples."

Apples were good too. Not as good as blueberries, but okay. As long as they weren't the green sour variety. I had a sudden thought. "We aren't going to the apple orchard you were telling me about, are we?"

Before he could say anything, Tigger came running up yelling at us to wait. "Man, I'm glad I caught you two before you left. If I hadn't Cub might have been eaten up or worse." I wondered what could be worse than being eaten and then decided I really didn't want to know.

"What are you talking about? Red asked. His face couldn't seem to make up its mind whether it wanted to be suspicious, concerned or to break out in a grin. The look on Tig's face was so serious and solemn that Red's face decided on concerned. I was pretty sure mine was also concerned although it's hard to tell when you can't see your own face.

"Cubster. He's new, remember? No one's going to recognize him as a Lost Boy yet. Not 'til he undergoes his initiation. You know."

"Please don't call me Cubster." There was something about that name that sounded really wrong. Everyone would think I was a snack cracker or something. "I thought everyone recognized us by the fact we're wearing pelts. Besides Red'll be with me and everyone recognizes him. Right?" I watched as Tig dug through his pockets and finally came up with a small paint brush and a bottle of something purple.

"They might recognize Red although that's not for certain. I'm coming too 'fore my brother decides…" he frowned and looked a little sad for a moment then shook the thought away. "Anyway, hold out your hand. Palm up."

I looked at Red who just rolled his eyes and shrugged. I held out my left hand, palm up. Tig opened the bottle, dipped the brush in and started to paint something on my palm. I pulled my hand back. "That tickles."

This time it was Tig's turn to roll his eyes. "Just hold it still. If ya don't, it'll ruin it and won't do you no good at all." I held up my palm again and managed to keep it still as he started painting again. His eyes were all screwed up in concentration and the tip of his tongue stuck out from the corner of his mouth. He hesitated once or twice, but finally finished. I took my hand back and saw what looked like a few Japanese or Chinese characters on it.

"What's this supposed to be?"

Tigger was busy dipping the brush into the bottle and then putting it in his mouth. "Blackberry juice," he explained. "And those," he said, pointing to my palm, "are the symbols which will let everyone on the island know you're a Lost Boy. You just gotta be careful who you show it to. Pirates will use it as an excuse to split you in two, but you already know what they look like. Trolls and orcs might decide to attack, but then they'd probably decide that no matter what you were. Elves will…"

"Elves?" I asked excitedly. "Are we going to see elves?" Tig and Red exchanged looks. "Well are we? I didn't even know there were elves in Neverland. Or trolls or orcs, for that matter. I didn't see them mentioned in the books. Just pixies."

Red started walking. "I'll tell you about it on the way. If we don't take off now, we're never going to get anywhere." Tig and I fell in behind Red who started down a path I was familiar with by this time. Paths were another strange thing about Neverland. Every time I went anywhere on the island, this path was where the trip began. Even if I was sure the way we were traveling had led us to Pirtate's Cove last night, it might lead to Mermaid Lagoon or Skull Rock or anywhere else this morning. There were only a few trails that branched from it, and I'd never been on those yet.

"What's the deal with this trail? It never seems to lead to the same place twice unless it's an accident."

"I thought you wanted to know about the faeries and elves and stuff."

"I want to know about all of it." I had a feeling there was tons of things to find out about this place and I wanted to know about all of it. Just the thought of it excited me, which was a lot better than being scared by it. Tig laughed and said he knew the feeling but was pretty sure no one would ever know all the secrets the island kept.

"Okay, first the paths and stuff. You remember reading about how Neverland is made up of kid's dreams and stuff like that?" I nodded at Red, remembering the words, or at least the spirit of them, being in the books I'd read about Peter. "Cool. Then you'll know that means that everyone who's ever thought about this place has left a little bit behind of those dreams and thoughts. Because of that a lot of the island is always changing. There's always going to be Hangman's Tree, and Pirate's Cove and stuff like that, but there's always other stuff be added too. It's normally stuff like tree-houses and forts, lakes, streams and things like that. Sometimes they just merge into stuff that was already there and other times it's brand new stuff."

"I guess that figures," I said. "But it still don't explain about the paths."

"Sure it does. Since the island changes, so do the paths. That's why there might be a branch that exists one day and not the next. Or a bridge that suddenly appears or even a rock. It might be someone thought about it hard enough that it appeared. Cuz of that there's no path that runs to one place but a bunch of paths that run everywhere." He gave me an expectant look.

I thought about the explanation and my head started to hurt. It's not that it didn't make sense, it did in a Neverland sort of way. It wasn't that it was so hard to understand. I just wondered how you were supposed to keep stuff straight. I mean there were times in the 'real' world that I wouldn't have been surprised if I'd walked from the council flat I lived in to the corner store and ended up in Belfast somehow. Not a bad trick when you figured I didn't live in Northern Ireland but in England at the time. So trying to figure out how to get from one place to another when the path might lead you to a third, fourth or fifth place made me despair of ever finding my way around the island. I mentioned my fears to Tig and Red.

"Aw, you don't have to worry about that," Tig said. "They know where you want to go. Usually. Ya just sort of think about it and the path'll take you wherever you want. Or wherever it thinks you should go if it doesn't agree with you." The path we'd been traveling on was crossing through a swamp at the moment, and I was too busy following the others' footsteps to keep from losing a pawmoc in the sucking goo of the mud to come up with anything to say to that.

The trail meandered out of the swamp and back through forest. In front of me Tigger was talking to Red about something. Red shook his head a couple of times in answer to whatever Tig was saying before finally throwing up his hands and saying, "Fine." They each spat in their left hands and shook. I wondered what that was all about but the trail was now headed uphill and I had other uses for my breath at the moment. As we started down the other side of the hill, Tig looked back towards me. "Gum?" he asked, handing me a piece. I took it, since he was using his right hand to give it to me, stuck it in my mouth and started chewing. It was the typical pine sap gum, but didn't taste too bad. I was chewing away when I tripped or stumbled over something and went tumbling. There was a groan from Red which I was foolish enough to think was concern for me until I saw Tigger laughing as he accepted something from Red.

"What? You don't think I can walk and chew gum at the same time?" I demanded of Tigger.

He grinned as he helped me up. "I don't think anything. I'd say you pretty much proved it for me." I decided I needed to come up with something more than just sticking my tongue out at him. Like maybe water balloons filled with skunkwater or something. Not that there were any balloons and I sure didn't know where there was any skunkwater.

We continued down the trail towards a fork in the road where I'd been before. "I thought you were going to go see elves," Tig complained as Red took the left fork.

"That's what ya get for thinking without being properly equipped for it. I told Cub I'd get him something other than stew and he decided on apples."

"Whatever. I'm not going down there. I don't like apples that much."

"Not scared are you?" Red asked him with a grin. I was a little surprised because up to now I didn't know of anything that would cause Tigger to hesitate.

"No, I'm not scared. Not that it'd matter if I was. I'm just going to stay up here while you go looking for trouble in the orchard. You still going to try to show him some elves? If ya are, I'll come with ya for that. I wouldn't miss that for anything."

As Red agreed to meet Tig back at the fork I wondered once again what the big deal about elves was. How horrible could they be? I'd read everything I could get my paws on in the 'real' world about elves. They did cool stuff like dance in faery rings at the solstice, played great music, loved the woods and stuff like that. Sure there were a few that were described as being a bit snotty and none of them liked dwarves all that much, but they weren't all that bad. I wondered if they weren't just trying to play a trick on me or something.

As I walked behind Red towards the apple orchard, I began to get a funny feeling in my stomach and my head. This place was kind of weird, even for the Island. It didn't seem evil or anything, but kind of grouchy. Like it wanted me to know it didn't appreciate me and Red being here, but wasn't going to go through the effort to do anything about it unless we actually did something it didn't like. It wasn't going to give any hints about what that something might be either. There were no birds or insects either and even the wind didn't seem to make any noise as it passed by us going in the opposite direction as though it didn't want to be in the apple orchard either. "What is this place?" I whispered. I half expected him to laugh at the fact I was whispering, but his voice was softer than mine when he answered.

"I dunno. No one knows. It's sort of a good place to escape from pirates if you need to cuz they won't come near here. But sometimes being caught by pirates isn't the worst thing that can happen."

"So if being here is such a bad thing, then what are we doing here?" At that moment my stomach rumbled reminding me of the reason for the trip. "Oh," I said. Red laughed softly.

We continued into the orchard a few hundred yards. It looked just like a normal apple orchard or what I figured an apple orchard was supposed to look like. There were tons of trees full of apples. They didn't look like they'd be easy to climb, but there were lots of apples hanging close to the ground. We both started grabbing apples and shoving them in our pockets. "What's that I asked?" pointing to a house that was on a little rise and partially hidden by the trees.

Red didn't even have to look. "That's the house. It's falling down and makes a lot of noises. The wolves will come into the orchard, but they won't go near that place. Surefoot went in there once and said it was like being nowhere and everywhere all at once."

Naturally I ignored the house part completely when I heard about the new danger. "Wolves?" I looked around. "You think they're here now?" I had visions of suddenly having my throat ripped out or something equally enjoyable.

"They might be. I could give a howl and see if any of them answers."

"Are you crazy? Why would I want you to do that?"

"They're pretty cool. We play tag with them all the time. We play hide-n-seek with them sometimes too. We never win when we play that, though. They say they don't use their noses, but they sure do find us awfully quick." He looked at me. "Don't worry, they're friendly. You just have to be careful of the fleas though."

"Fleas? What about them?"

"Aw, they think that they keep getting them from us. I figure they already have them and they're just pulling our tails but they always make a big deal about it." I wish he hadn't mentioned it because now my hair itched something fierce.

We grabbed a few more apples and headed out of the orchard. The feeling of irritation was still in the air, but there was something under it as well. I felt like something was watching me and wondered aloud if it might have been the wolves that Red had been talking about. "I don't feel anything," he said, looking around. "Normally we can tell when they're nearby." I didn't see anything either, but couldn't shake the feeling of something watching and calling until we crossed the boundary of the orchard.

Tig was waiting for us at the fork and gave us the once over as if to be sure we hadn't lost any pieces or blood. "How'd it go?" he asked in a concerned manner. Red replied by throwing him an apple that Tig started eating. I took one out of my pocket and took a bite. It probably would have tasted better if I'd gotten rid of the gum first but even with the taste of pine tar it tasted wonderful. I'd never paid much attention to apples before. I liked apples, but my sweet tooth usually called out for something else. I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have if these apples had been around.

"Are we going to go see the elves now?" I asked through a mouthful of apple. Red wiped the pieces of chewed apple off the side of his face that had suddenly appeared there.

"You sure you want to do this?" Tigger asked me. "I mean really, really, really sure?"

"Uh, yeah. Why not?"

"Okay, don't tell me I didn't warn you." I looked at Red who shrugged and made a twirling motion with his finger by his ear. This time we took off down the other fork of the trail, followed it for a few hundred feet and then cut out cross-country. It was just like any other portion of woods until we got to the creek. It was more like a small river and looked really deep. There was a wide log that crossed it that was so low the water lapped against the bottom of it. I watched as Red walked across the log and Tig made a production of crossing by jumping across on one foot. With a sigh I carefully started across, not moving more than four or five inches with each step. I got to the middle of the log when something bumped it hard and I went flying into the water.

"C'mon, Cubby. You're not even chewing gum," Tigger said with a laugh. I could have explained that something had hit the log, but was pretty sure I knew how far I'd get with that. I could barely touch the bottom of the creek bed with my paws and started slowly wading towards the bank.

"Run, Cubby. Hurry up," Red started shouting. He and Tig pulled slingshots out of their pockets and started shooting rocks at me.

"Hey," I shouted at them, wondering why they were trying to bean me with rocks. Red pointed wildly behind me and I looked back to see that they weren't shooting rocks at me but the huge crocodile that was rapidly swimming towards me.

There aren't a whole lot of advantages to being as craven as I am. You tend to worry about stupid things a lot, you wonder if you're good enough to be a Lost Boy and in the back of your mind there's a question of how you'll react when someone needs your help in battle. On the plus side, there's a lot to the saying that fear lends wings to your feet. It's amazing how fast you can dog-paddle when you see a mouth full of teeth bearing down on you. There was another hail of stones, only two of which hit me, and then I was climbing onto the creek bank without any problem at all. I got to my feet, took a couple of steps back, and stood there looking at the crocodile stare back at me from the water while my sides heaved. "I thought he was on _our_ side," I complained as the crocodile slowly swam away. I guess I wasn't worth the effort to come out of the water for, although I don't have any doubt he could have if he'd wanted to.

"What ever gave you that idea?" Red said as he stuffed the slingshot back in his pocket.

"In the books he's always going after Hook."

"Course he does," Tig said, the worried expression on his face changing to a grin. "but he also goes after Lost Boys, elves, dwarves, and anything else he can get his mitts on. Hook may be his favorite, but he's not too picky when it comes to food. Although, I don't know that I've ever left any of Stumble's stew out for him. I wonder how he'd like that." The wheels started turning behind Tig's eyes and I figured it wouldn't be too long before Stumble erupted again over an implied insult to his stew.

"Isn't he supposed to tick?"

"Ticked off maybe, but I don't think he ticks."

"Not Stumble. The crocodile. I thought you could always tell when he was on his way because of the alarm clock inside of him."

"Oooooooooooooohhhh, yeah. You didn't hear it?" Tig asked. He shook his head. "I'll have to let Surefoot know that laziness almost got the newest Lost Boy killed. He'll owe you something over that. I'd make him do dishes or the latrine or something."

"What's Surefoot got to do with whether or not the crocodile was ticking?" Even to me that didn't make any sense.

"It was his turn to wind the clock," Tigger said and then broke into laughter with Red. Way more than I thought the joke called for. I sighed and followed as Tigger started leading the way towards wherever it was that elves hung out on the Island. The pawmocs made wonderful squishing noises with each step I took.


	10. Chapter 10: Elves and Clouds

There weren't anymore interesting incidents after the encounter with the crocodile. The path we eventually settled on wound through an ancient forest. The trees were huge and streamers of moss hung from them. A slight breeze rustles the leaves and gently moved the tree branches. A deer grazing next to the path looked up at us and then continued eating as we passed by. "Are we almost there?" I asked Tig.

"We're just on the outskirts, it'll take us a little while longer to get to where they hang out unless we run across any rangers. If we do, you have to be ready to show them the palm of your hand where I painted those runes on so that they'll know you're one of us."

"You seriously think they wouldn't get that I'm a Lost Boy even though I'm wearing a pelt?"

"You can't be too careful. They might mistake you for a real bear or something like that, and then where would you be? Stuck as some elven prince's performing bear until you could persuade him that you weren't a bear and then you'd be his performing Lost Boy. That wouldn't work either cuz you probably can't juggle."

I was certain my leg was being pulled now and I took another look at the runes on my palm trying to figure out what they meant and once again failing miserably. I tried changing the subject instead. "How come none of the books or movies mention elves? I didn't even know there were elves or stuff like that 'til Peter told me on the trip from the 'real' world."

Red shrugged as we continued through the peaceful twilight of the forest. The sun was probably overhead by now, but the canopy of the trees was so thick that its light barely made it to where we were. Rather than being stifling or worrisome, it was pretty nice. "There's lots of stuff that's not mentioned in the books that's here." Red pointed to a tree we were passing by. "I ain't ever seen that tree mentioned, but I bet if you walked into it, it'd hurt."

"Don't give him any suggestions," Tig advised. I stuck my tongue out at him since I wasn't going to waste an apple to throw at him.

"You gotta remember that part of this place is what it's dreamed to be. The paths and stuff I mentioned earlier? Same thing. I dunno how, and I don't know that anyone does, but that's the way it is. Why else would there be pirates and Indians and elves and dwarfs? There ain't no point in trying to figure that stuff out anyway. It'd only drive you crazy. There's a lot of stuff that didn't come from someone's wishes I guess but who knows what's what and who cares? I wouldn't trade it for anything."

I had to agree with Red on that point. There's no other placed I'd rather be that I could think of. The thought of stuff just suddenly existing bothered me a little bit at first, but it seemed like things didn't happen quite that quick. And it was obvious every wish thought about what the Island should be like didn't happen cuz there wouldn't be any room. My head started to hurt and I figured that Red was right. There wasn't any real need to question stuff as long as you could play in the middle of it.

Up ahead the woods looked like they started to thin out a little and the light was brighter. Before I could ask about it, Tig led us off the path and behind a hedge that looked too straight and uniform to have just grown like that. "We're almost there," Tig whispered, "so we gotta be careful."

"How come? They evil or something?"

Tig shook his head. "Keep your voice down in case they hear us," he whispered. "It's not that they're evil, they think we are."

"Us? How can we be? We fight pirates and stuff like that."

"Shhhhhh. It's not that they really think we're evil, it's just that elves can be pretty formal and have rules for everything and we kinda don't so they figure we're different from them and they kind of look down at us cuz of it."

"They just don't want us around cuz they're afraid we'll ruin their gardens or break something or be a bad influence. They're really snotty and whenever one of us is around act like they smell something bad," Red explained.

"Silly pointy eared…" Tig's voice trailed off into a mumble.

"Peter has pointed ears," I pointed out carefully, remembering his reaction to my asking if he was an elf on the trip over.

"Oh man, don't ever let him catch you saying you think he might be an elf," Red said loudly enough that Tigger shushed him. "He once forced someone to walk the plank when they said that."

"Peter Pan made a Lost Boy walk the plank?" I couldn't believe such a thing, no matter how angry he'd been.

"Well, not really. It was a pirate and it was during a raid. If he hears a Lost Boy call him an elf than Pan'll call him horrible and awful names and banish him for a long time. Almost a whole week."

"So why are we crouched behind this bush just waiting here? Are we banished from elves too?"

"Yeah, Tig. Why are we just waiting here? Huh? Is there a reason we're just hanging out here instead of going down the path like millions of Lost Boys before us have probably done?"

I looked at Tigger who surprisingly looked embarrassed. "It wasn't my fault." Red just stared at Tig until he finally sighed. "Okay, okay. A couple weeks ago I came down here. You know, there wasn't anything else happening and Leo was busy doing something and I just felt like wandering. Anyway, there was some big celebration or party or something they were planning for later in the day and they had this big table set up with stuff."

"Yeah, go on," Red prodded as Tig stopped. There was another sigh.

"So anyway there's all this stuff on this table and no one around, least that I could see, so I kinda borrowed a couple of lemon cakes."

"Lemon cakes?" I exclaimed. "You mean the type that has the sort of crust on it and the filling?"

"Exactly. It also has that custard…" Tig was interrupted by a loud throat clearing from Red. "Anyway, I borrowed a couple of lemon cakes and then I saw this huge bowl of punch looking stuff and I had some pixie dust and I kinda dropped it in the punch bowl."

"So?" I finally said when Tig didn't continue. The way he'd been talking, I'd figured he did something horrible like 'borrowing' a whole platter of lemon cakes or turning the table over or flinging mud everywhere. Putting pixie dust in a bowl of punch didn't really sound like that big a deal. "What'd it do, float away or something?"

Red chuckled. "Pixie dust only makes ya fly if you're thinking happy thoughts and about flying. The punch just stayed there and then the elves drank it." I looked at him in confusion. I'd never heard that pixie dust was poison. Red rolled his eyes. "Elves have delicate… constitutions. When they eat pixie dust it kind of backs up on them and can be sort of explosive."

Tig snorted. "Just come out and say it. It gives 'em gas."

"You mean…?" They both nodded. "And they…?" They both nodded again. "And they know it was you?"

"I don't know. A couple of elves saw me but that was when I was away from the banquet place. I didn't know they were having a music thing in the upper meadow and didn't get away before I was spotted."

"Maybe they just figured it was bad peaches," Red said.

"A theory which has now been disproven and the real cause of the malady known," an upper-class voice said as I felt a pinprick on the back of my neck. "I had occasion to sample some of that beverage and was most unhappy at the outcome."

"Really?" Tig asked with a groan.

"Hardly," another cultured voice chimed in. "Few and far between are the youngers invited to an upper function celebration and certainly not this delinquent. Let us simply say we were witness to the aftereffects which were both loud and prolonged. It has been a long time since I've had such merriment." The pinprick on my neck disappeared. "I do not believe we have had the pleasure of meeting the rotund bear between you and thus introductions in order."

The three of us rose from where we'd been crouched behind the shrub and turned to see what could only be two elves standing in front of us. They were both about the same height, a little taller than Red, and were even thinner than he was. Their both had blonde hair and pointed ears as well as blue eyes that slanted up a little towards the corners. They were dressed in green that shimmered as they move and reflected the green of the hedge. One of them was sheathing a rapier which is what I supposed had been the pinprick on the back of my neck. They looked just like I thought they would except younger than I'd imagined. "Master Alfrontino and Master Reynardionio at your service," the elf on the left said. "Or, Alf," he said pointing to himself, "and "Rey," pointing at his companion.

I started to tell them my name when Tig elbowed me. I looked over and he gestured with his hand. "Oh, yeah." I held up my palm. Both the elves eyes widened as they read what it said. Rey glanced at Tigger who looked as though he could barely contain himself trying not to laugh, and then looked back at me. "I am afraid that I do not understand the phrase on your hand," the elf said. "It says, 'purple fish muskrat go moon.'"

"Huh?" Tig said, looking surprised. "But…"

I tried again. "I'm Cubby. I just got to the Island and became a Lost Boy."

"_You_ managed to fly using the magic dust?" Alf said, in surprise. "It is truly astounding that so much of it existed at one time." His laugh wasn't very friendly and it was pretty obvious that the kidding I could expect from him wasn't the same type I got from the Lost Boys. I sighed having hoped that I'd left that sort of thing behind in the 'real' world.

"Enough," Rey said to the other elf. "Such a statement is neither called for nor is it true, I am sure."

"I am sure it is but am not going to waste the time or energy to argue the point with underlings or their deluded patron. It is not as though we did not already have enough misfits here, why must we suffer from more?" Alf spun a perfect half-circle and started to walk away.

"I'll…" Tig said and started after Alf but was restrained by both Red and Rey. "It is not worth the effort to change the mind of someone who is both ignorant and close-minded. As things turn he will get the reward that he has earned," Rey said.

"Maybe,' Tig said, "but I'd sure like to help him get that reward now instead of later." There were spots of red on his cheeks and a look of anger I'd never seen before. "Why do you hang out with him, anyway?"

"Sometimes things must be done that are satisfying to neither party," Rey said in a tone that said the discussion was over. "Would you like me to guide you through the steading so you might observe?" I wasn't sure I wanted that at all now. Things seemed to be sort of ruined from what I'd expected. "There is one thing that I needs must do before hand," he said taking me aside and stepping away from Red and Tigger. "Your hand," the elf whispered to me when we were out of earshot. "I told an untruth about that which is written there. In actuality it states that you are a type of large furball. You should probably eradicate the runes from your palm before displaying it again." I burst out laughing which surprised him a little. "This does not bother you?" he asked.

I looked back at Tig and Red who'd heard my laugh and looked as though they were trying to figure out exactly what was going on. "Naw. When Tig does it, it's like he's doing it because he knows it's funny and he knows I'll laugh about it. I make fun of my cravenness and size and the fact I'm clumsy all the time." He still looked confused and I struggled to try and explain. "I know they'd never be mean to me about stuff like that and I laugh about some of those things as much as they do. But then there are people who say stuff or laugh at stuff because they're mean and they know that I'll know they're doing it cuz it's mean. Umm… I think." I tried tracking what I'd just said on my fingers and managed to get two of them crossed so tightly I had to use my other hand to get them uncrossed.

Rey nodded. "I believe I understand the point you are trying to explain and the logic in which you arrived at it." We rejoined the others. All I said to Tigger was, "Furball?" which caused him to look a little sheepish but not for very long. His earlier anger seemed to have been forgotten.

The next couple of turnings of the glass was from some sort of fairy tale. The things that Rey showed me were awesome. Trees that had been around so long that you could almost tell how old they were simply by brushing against them. Water that had been enchanted to become bridges that looked so fragile they should have broken of their own weight yet didn't even tremble under my weight. Clouds of butterflies that were colours I'd never even imagined, must less seen, that flew from place-to-place. Their were gardens filled with everything imaginable and dwellings perched in the trees and pools that begged to be splashed and played in and paths that wandered by impossible sculptures of earth, glass, rock and plants. The steading was surrounded on all sides by the ancient forest which gave it the impression of a large island in the middle of a vast ocean of trees. Even in the middle of the huge place, I was aware of the forest surrounding it. It was the most amazing and beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life.

Along with all that, there was something else. Perfection. A creepy perfection. Absolutely nothing was out of place. Small elves, children I figured, walked along the paths. There was no yelling or screaming or playing on the grass that looked as thick as a carpet. Grass didn't grow beyond the boundaries of yards or fields and not a single butterfly strayed from the pack. Things were so perfect that my stomach hurt a little and I kept looking up, expecting a giant hand to reach down from the sky, pick up the steading, and shake it to cause snow to fall. Then there were the elves. They weren't mean, although I heard some of the smaller ones snickering after they'd passed by us. The elves didn't say anything to us. In fact they acted like we weren't even there. A couple of them nodded to Rey, although a lot more looked at him as though he was nuts for hanging out with us. They didn't make any attempt to stop us or prevent us from going anywhere, but I always got the feeling that they were watching to catch us doing something wrong. There had been a lot of times in my life in the 'real' world where I felt like I didn't belong, but none of them came close to this. During the entire time he was showing us around he reeled off rule after rule. Behaviour, where to go, where not to go, how to do things, how not to do thing. My head started to hurt from all of it.

As we were getting ready to leave, Rey told me he was pleased to meet such a stout-hearted lad as myself in a way that made it clear he was teasing in a good way. I wondered why all elves couldn't be like him. He told Tig that he'd meet him in the usual place and then gracefully glided away in the walk that all elves seemed to have. It didn't seem like elves ever ran. None of us said a word until we reached the border where the ancient forest became our messy, 'well-lived in' woods. I felt like I could breathe again.

"I tried to warn you," Tig said, a bit wistfully. I'd figured he was going to start giving me a hard time about what I'd imagined elves to be, but he'd apparently gone through the same thing. "Yeah, I was ready for something completely different too. It took a little bit of getting used to. But wait 'til the solstice. Elves act like they're supposed to then." He just grinned and wouldn't say anything except that I'd have to wait and see for myself. Red seemed to know what he meant, but wouldn't say anything else either.

I asked about Rey and was told he was part of a group of elves that were considered very 'radical' because they sometimes hung out with us. Alf wasn't part of the group. "I dunno why he was with Rey," Tig said as he worried at it. "I've seen him before, but never with Rey. We accidentally got in a fight because he thought I'd borrowed his hat." Red asked if he had and got a disgusted look from Tig for the question.

We continued walking towards Hangman's Tree in a somber mood, the sky above us beginning to get dark and a crescent moon beginning to make itself known. Red and Tig got in an argument about a pine cone they were kicking and I passed right by a blueberry patch without even giving it a second glance.

"This is dumb," Red finally said out loud. He pointed at me, "You're coming with me. Red, go get the others and meet me at the _other_ tree and be sure to tell Leo to bring his bow." A grin lit up Tig's face and he took off running.

I asked where we were going but all I got in return was a promise that I'd see when we got there. The trip took us through a bunch of meadows and fields, fireflies guiding our way. We climbed over a couple of hedges, although Red had to wait a couple of minutes while I pulled the splinters out, and ended up next to a tree that looked normal except that I couldn't see where it ended. It was the perfect climbing tree with sturdy branches spaced just the right distance apart and was illuminated by the fireflies which had gorwn to a huge flock. "How tall is it?" I asked Red, trying in vain to see the top.

"It goes to the clouds."

"The clouds? C'mon."

"You need to believe in stuff more, Cubby," Surefoot said as he walked up and scrubbed the top of my head with his fist. "You know what happens when you don't believe in stuff, don't ya?" I shook my head. Surefoot looked around and whispered, "It could mean you're growing up."

"Aw, no way." There were a lot of things I figured I had to worry about, but growing up wasn't ever going to be one of them.

Surefoot suddenly got serious and then nodded. "Yeah, I have a feeling you're right, Cub." By this time the rest of the group that Surefoot had arrived with were ringed around the tree, the fireflies illuminating their excited faces. Leo had a bow over his shoulder and a quiver of arrows on his back.

"You ready?" Red asked me.

I looked at the tree and grinned. "Sure," I said, even though I had no clue as to what it was I was supposed to be ready for.

"'k, here's what happens. We gotta climb a long way up. I mean a real long way. And you can't fall out of this tree."

"You better not fall, cuz I'll be right below you," Roo grumbled.

"Then what?" I asked. "Then you'll see," Red said with a smirk. I thought about yelling but Leo, Tig and Surefoot had already started up the tree. Red followed and then I started up with Roo and Stumble bringing up the rear and the fireflies continuing to light up everything.

I ain't sure what it is about climbing trees. I hate hills and stairs for the obvious reasons, but I love climbing trees. It's one of the few things I do really well even though I also fall out of trees a lot. I wasn't sure what type of tree this was, but it wasn't a pine tree so I didn't end up with sap all over my pelt, hands, or face. Even though it was night by this time, it didn't bother us any. There were still fireflies all over the place and the moon provided a lot of light even just being a crescent moon. The trunk of the tree swayed a little as a breeze wandered by, but not enough to cause even me to have to worry about falling. The climb was long enough that I started daydreaming at some point, you can only see so many branches in front of your face before your mind starts to wander to other places, and didn't come back to the here-and-now 'til Red accidentally stepped on my hand.

"Sorry, Cub. This is as high as we go."

I looked around. The trunk continued upward and I still couldn't see the top. The ground was invisible below, but it could have been because it was dark as much as because of the distance. I watched in awe as a cloud passed by in front of us. "Not that one," I heard Tigger say. "We need a bigger one." A number of smaller clouds passed in front of the tree. I was ready to ask Red what we were waiting for when Tigger shouted, "That one."

In front of the tree was a huge cloud. "It's not a storm cloud, is it?" Leo said, taking the bow off his shoulder and notching an arrow to it.

"Nope. No lightning. Go for it."

Leo took aim and let the arrow fly. It landed unerringly in the center of the cloud. "Sweet," someone said. Leo returned the bow to his shoulder and then started hauling in on the line that was attached to the arrow. I hadn't seen it before, but in the moonlight it glowed silver. As Leo pulled, the cloud came closer until it was right next to the tree. Leo threw a large coil of the line on the cloud and tied the other end to the tree. I watched in wonder as Tigger jumped from the tree to the trunk and bounced across the surface of the cloud. In another instant Leo joined him along with Surefoot. Red climbed to where the others had been and stepped from the limb to the cloud's surface.

"Go on Cubby. You're next," Roo said from below me.

I slowly climbed up to where the cloud was. I moved my left foot from the tree limb to just above the surface of the cloud and froze. "I can't," I finally choked out after a minute like that. "What if it doesn't hold me and I fall?" Even if it would be like falling out of a tree, I'd never been this high up in a tree before.

"You won't, Cubby. All you gotta do is believe. We'll help you." The fireflies continued flying around as if to help encourage me.

"But what if I don't believe hard enough?"

"How can you not believe hard enough?" Tigger asked. "Look where you're at. Just the fact you made it here, that Peter brought you, means you believe a ton. C'mon. Grab my hand," he said, holding it out.

I looked at the other guys who were standing on the cloud and not falling through and then at the ones below me waiting for me so they could hop on it. "Can't we use pixie dust?" I asked in a final attempt.

"Nope. It's not the same. You can do it. Trust us," Tigger said again, continuing to hold his hand out. I took Tig's hand, screwed my eyes shut, and stepped onto the surface of the cloud. For a minute it felt like what standing on gelatin must feel like or stepping on a huge feather bed. My foot sank a little, then there was kind of a tentative firmness. I put more weight on my foot and started forward. There was a ripping sound like someone tearing a sheet and my foot went straight through and I started to follow. Tig grabbed my other hand and started pulling. Someone else grabbed for me and ended up with my hair The ripping sound continued for another moment and then stopped along with my downward motion. Both my legs were through the cloud and flailing in the air. My torso had been sliding backwards to follow my legs, but Tigger still had my hands and Surefoot had his arms around Tigger's middle with his feet dug into the cloud's surface, both of them pulling with all their might. I watched as one of Surefoot's feet slid forward a little causing a small hill of cloud to form and then dissolve into mist. Leo had a death grip on my hair and was also pulling with all his might. I screwed my eyes shut again hoping that not being able to see anything might make it all go away.

"Cubby," Red said as matter-of-factly as one could through clenched teeth, "you're not believing hard enough."

"I don't know how to believe any harder," I yelled. I was sorta on edge. "What am I supposed to do? How do I do it?"

"You believe you're one of us," Red said in a voice that was way too calm. "You flew and you saw elves and you fought with pirates. You're almost one of us, but you gotta do one more thing."

"What?"

"You gotta believe in you. We do or we wouldn't have brought you up here."

If this was a fairy tale, this would be the point where a bunch of music started playing and there'd be some sort of magical creatures heralding a sudden transformation in me from craven to bravery and then I'd pull myself out of the hole in the cloud and laugh at my fears. It didn't happen that way. It took a few more minutes of talking and explaining until I believed enough to keep falling through anymore. Then there was another few minutes when the others pulled and pulled until I popped out of the hole in the cloud. I flew a foot up in the air and landed face first on the cloud. I held my breath but didn't go through. My laugh was a bit on the hysterical side, but in a few moments I was bouncing all over the cloud with the rest of them and tumbling down the hill of cloud in the middle. Surefoot grabbed the back of my pelt to keep me from falling over the side. "Just because you can walk on a cloud doesn't mean you can walk on air," he reminded me with a grin.

The cloud drifted around the island, tethered to it by the line tied to the tree. It was the most fantastic thing I'd ever done before. We played 'King of the Hill' and pointed out places on the island to each other, which was barely visible below us, and watched the stars that seemed just out of reach. Shooting stars colored the sky and I made wish-upon-wish. Not for myself but stuff for those in the 'real' world and things like wishing that there were more blueberries. Maybe that last one was kinda for me. Eventually we ran down and we pondered on things such as 'why' and 'what if' and other stuff we normally wouldn't have gone near if we weren't all in that place between being awake and dreaming. Eventually the sky far west of us started to lighten just a bit. I started awake, gave a huge yawn, and turned to look at Leo who looked almost as tired as I felt. It was hard to tell though. The fireflies had given up hours ago and the moon had long since set. Still there was a ton of stars out to provide a little light. "When do we start climbing down?" I figured at some point we'd haul ourselves back to the tree and climb down.

"That's one of the best parts. Look over the egde" he said sleepily. For a moment I wondered if he was dreaming but took a look over the edge. Below the ground was about a regular tree's height away and looked very familiar. I asked him if we were sinking. "Naw. We're on a cloud. A cloud turning to fog. In a little bit we'll just be able to step off into the branches of the tree."

As Leo predicted the cloud became a wide-spreading fog and we ended up right where Hangman's Tree was. When I asked about the arrow and the line connecting the cloud to the other tree, Red just shrugged and said no one was quite sure what happened to them but this is Neverland and all sorts of things happened that you really couldn't explain, "and why would you want to? It's just magic."

Everyone was in the common room getting ready to greet the morning by being fast asleep. I was on my pallet under the table when a question suddenly bubbled to the top of my brain. "Hey, Surefoot?"

"What? I was almost asleep," he said in a groggy voice

"Has anyone ever fallen like I did before?"

"Cour they ha…ve. Ev one does fir time. Bu harder t pu you out."

"What? Ouch!" I said, as I sat up and hit my head on the bottom of the table. The only response I got was someone snoring. I lay back down pondering Surefoot's answer that everyone fell through the cloud like me on their first attempt. I fell asleep trying to figure out if that made me feel better or worse.


	11. Chapter 11: Braving Tink & a Raid

"Red, come quick. Ya gotta help me before she finds out," I said, galloping so fast I ran into him and bowled him over.

"Calm down, Cubs. What's wrong? Before who finds out?" I was so upset the words were tumbling out of my mouth so fast that there wasn't anything holding them together. Red let me ramble for a few minutes before he said, "Blueberries."

"Where?" I said, looking wildly around. He laughed as he got up and then helped pull me to my feet.

"Knew that would get you. Now what's going on and who's going to find out?"

"Tink! That's who." Red's eyes got wider and he whistled. Tink was pretty awesome. At least until she got upset about something. Once that happened, it was every Lost Boy for himself. Even Leo, who would stand up to pirates, dragons, and anything else you could think of, backed down when Tinker Bell went on a rampage. I seemed to have some sort of special talent for making her a little less than happy with me. Last week she'd sprinkled pixie dust on my rump because I accidentally stepped on a thimble she'd been working on and I'd hung upside down from the common room ceiling for a few hours until it had warn off.

"What'd ya do?" he whispered as if afraid she was listening in and would blame him as much as me if she discovered him talking to me.

"I accidentally flooded her flat," I whispered back. Red winced. "It wasn't my fault. I mean it was, but it wasn't. You remember the other day when we were playing 'Follow-the-Leader' and I made a wrong turn and fell into that mud puddle?" Red nodded. It hadn't been all a mistake, since it was a perfect mud puddle for splashing in and there were enough of the others close enough that they would have gotten splattered too, but when I lifted my left foot to stomp my right foot went flying in the air and I landed in the middle of it. Mud flew everywhere, but mostly it was everywhere on me. "It wasn't dry when we got back to Hangman's Tree and I used my trapdoor and my slide got all muddy. Then it dried and now I can hardly get down it anymore."

"You sure that isn't from too many blueberries?" Red asked in a normal voice and laughing.

"C'mon, this is serious. I'm going to get slaughtered. Anyway, I asked Tig what to do…"

"That was a brilliant plan."

"Yeah, tell me about it. He told me to get that old wooden bucket by the fireplace, fill it with water, and pour it down my slide a few times and then slide down it a few times and that would take care of everything."

"Yeah, that sounds like a pretty good plan." There was surprise in Red's voice that Tig would do something that didn't involve a joke of some sort. "So what went wrong?"

"There's a gap between where the slide ends and my trapdoor goes into the common room. When I poured the water down the slide, instead of ending up on the floor, it kinda ended up in Tink's flat."

"Didn't you see that sign that says 'Mind the Gap'?"

"Red," I pleaded, "this is serious. She's going to kill me and then she's going to kill whatever's left over. It's not fair that I survived falling through a cloud only to have a pixie destroy me."

"Aw, she ain't going to destroy you. So her place got some water in it. Big deal. She might thank you for cleaning it or something."

"You don't understand. There was so much water that it washed everything out of it. There's stuff all over the floor below it and it's all soggy and ruined looking."

Red looked around and started whispering again. "She's going to destroy you."

It took a lot of talking and a promise to take his turn at gourd cleaning and latrine cleaning (which was never, ever mentioned in any book I read) before he finally agreed to come with me back to Hangman's Tree to help me see if anything could be salvaged and put to rights before Tink found out. I galloped back as fast as my legs would take me, with Tig following. I climbed through my trapdoor, slid down the slide, and popped out the other side and skidded on the wet floor of the common room, landing in a heap by the table. Peter was sitting on his throne with Tinker Bell jangling loudly enough it hurt my ears. Leo, Tig and Stumble were trying to ease as far away from Tink as they could without being obvious about it and I watched as Red stuck his head out of his trapdoor, gulped, and managed to turn around and escape without actually coming into the room at all.

Tink turned at the noise I made with my graceful entrance. She stared at me and the mud all over my pelt. It wasn't at all unusual for me to be covered in mud from red hair to pawmoc claws, so that didn't worry me. Then her gave went from me to my trapdoor and from there to the doorway of her flat, halfway up the wall. The room in the air crackled and she turned bright red. Leo, Tigger and Stumble gave me sympathetic looks before breaking ranks and escaping, leaving only me, Peter and Tinker Bell in the common room. Tink flew to where I was still lying on the floor and landed on my chest. She marched from there to my chin and looked down at me shaking a fist and jangling incessantly. It was definitely not happy jangling. I looked over at Peter when she was done.

"She says you're a furball and clumsy as an ox and that she's going to destroy you." Tinker Bell did some more jangling. "Aw, you can't do that to him, Tink. It'd make a mess and who'd make the Lost Boys laugh by falling out of trees?" More jangling and chiming occurred. "No, you can't do that either. He'd drown and the mermaids would get all upset." Tink stamped on my chin, chimed a few more seconds and then gave me a smile that scared me to death before zooming across and out the room.

"Wow, Furball. I've never seen Tinker Bell that upset before. I gotta banish you for messing up her flat, but only for a few hours. She says if you can get other stuff for the stuff you ruined, she won't destroy you. Hey! You could do that while you're banished. Deal?" He flew over to where I was on the floor and spat into his hand. I spat in mine and we sealed the deal. I figured it was better doing that then looking over my shoulder for an enraged pixie for the next century.

I dug through the chest that sat next to my pallet under the table and stuffed my pockets with odds and ends while Peter told me exactly what I needed to replace. It seemed like an awfully long list for a place that was so tiny, but I didn't argue about it. Peter wished me luck and reminded me I was banished for a few hours before I squeezed through my trapdoor and back outside Hangman's Tree.

"You're still in…" Leo started.

"…one piece. There's not even…" Tig continued.

"…anything missing from you…"

"…or your pelt," Tig finished up. They both looked at each other in amazement.

"What happened?" Red asked, looking a little embarrassed that he'd turned tail. I couldn't even begin to blame him. I explained that I'd been banished, which got a lot of gasps until I led them know how long I'd been banished for, and what I had to do to get back in Tink's good graces. Tigger mumbled an apology saying he didn't know that it'd be as bad as it was which let me know that he'd planned it that way, and offering to help me find the replacement stuff. Leo, Red, and Surefoot offered their help as well and we started off on the scavenger hunt.

By the time the end of the day came, we'd crisscrossed a lot of the southern end of the island trading the stuff I'd stuffed in my pockets for a lot of the ruined stuff. It was a lot easier finding pixie-sized stuff than I'd have figured it would be, but then there were a lot of pixies on the Island too. The stuff we couldn't trade for we searched for. Things like a six-leaf clover that was green and orange, the sound the breeze makes over water, and a round seashell with four sides. Those took a little longer. As the sun began to sink, we brought the stuff to Hangman's Tree where Tinker Bell was waiting for us. Peter wasn't anywhere to be found, but Roo was able to translate for us. We displayed each piece for Tinker Bell's examination. After a lot of chiming, Roo said that Tinker Bell decided it'd do.

"She's calling you Furball, you know," Roo said with a grin. "She says it's part of your punishment for soaking her stuff."

"Furball?" Red tried it a few more times. "It kinda fits, although I can't imagine why."

I groaned, knowing that I was going to be known as 'Furball' as often as I was going to be known as 'Cubby'. Still there were worst things that could have happened. I felt even better when Tink made a long speech while nodding at me. We all looked at Roo when she finished.

"Wow. She says she's sorry she got so upset with you. That she knows you're kinda clumsy and that it wasn't all your fault. There was some other stuff too, but mostly about you being clumsy and stuff like that." Tink smiled at me, and not one that made me figure I was a goner, and disappeared into her flat. I was roundly congratulated for still breathing before we all headed outside into the night to play 'Ghost in the Graveyard'.

A few days went by and I'd all but forgotten about being worried that Tinker Bell might destroy me. There'd been some talk that we'd be going on a pirate raid soon and I let that take the place of worrying about any payback that Tink might be planning. I woke up one morning to find Stumble in front of the stewpot with a frown on his face. "Hey Cub, you think that apples and dandelions would be okay in the rest of this fish and oyster stew? I'm out of everything else."

I'm pretty sure I turned a great shade of green while shaking my head no as hard as I could. Stumble grumbled about being underappreciated and headed off, threatening to find some eels or jellyfish that would probably be just as good. I had just decided it was a good time to head out to find something to eat that was anything but stew when the gourd on the table caught my eye. It was full of blueberries. Even better, it was full of blueberries with sugar on top. It wasn't stew, so I figured it was fair game and began eating.

A few minutes later a yawning Roo joined me and looked at the gourd curiously. "What you got there?"

"Blueberries," I said through a mouthful of them. "With sugar."

"Sugar? The only place to get sugar around here is on the pirate's ship." He took the bowl, held it up to his face and took a sniff. He immediately sneezed and I decided he could have the rest of them. "That's not sugar," he said, sneezing once more. "That's pixie dust."

"Pixie dust? But that means I'm going to… Oh man, I'd better get going fast," I said, remembering what had happened to the elves when Tig had accidentally added pixie dust to their punch.

"Why? There ain't no way you're going to make it?" Roo said. I looked at him as though he was crazy.

"Are you crazy? Of course I'm getting out of here." I started to get up and hiccupped.

"What good is leaving going to do?" Roo asked. I explained what I'd been told about the elves and pixie dust. I hiccupped again and looked surprised when Roo started laughing. "That's elves. You're human or at least slightly less than human. It doesn't work on you that way." I hiccupped once more, and this time a stream of purple bubbles came out of my mouth and drifted towards the ceiling. "That's what pixie dust does to Lost Boys."

I let loose with five or six hiccups in a row, each one creating a stream of purple bubbles. The ceiling above me was beginning to get crowded with them. "How long does this last?" I asked, hiccupping between each word and creating more purple bubbles.

Roo shrugged. "It just depends. At least half the day. Longer depending on how much blueberries and pixie dust you ate." By the end of the day it appeared I had eaten a lot. Purple bubbles were over halfway from the ceiling to the floor and we'd started cramming them into the tons of cubbies, crawlspaces and nooks that Hangman's Tree contained. The whole place smelled of blueberries and the dirt floor was beginning to turn a deep shade of purple, along with tables, benches and the blankets on pallets and hammocks. I think Roo was beginning to regret not having thrown me out when it first started. I also discovered it was impossible to sleep or play any sort of game when you're busy erupting in purple bubbles every few seconds. At one point I ventured the opinion that I'd never eat blueberries again which caused everyone to start laughing for some reason.

At some point in the afternoon Tink appeared and expressed concern at my condition with the most innocent of grins. She wished me a speedy recovery, at least that's what Roo said she was saying, and made her exit from the room. It was kinda spoiled by her flying into one of the bubbles and getting trapped until Leo popped it with the tip of an arrow. She was an interesting shade of purple and was not smiling at all by the time she disappeared into her flat.

"Hey!" Stumble said while he was beating Leo at dominoes late that evening.

"What?" Leo and I said together.

"Cubby ain't hic-ing anymore. The silence is almost deafening. I'm surprised you didn't not hear it."

I held my breath, waiting to see what would happen. A few seconds went by, then a minute. Then another minute. "Cub, you gotta breathe, you're turning blue," Leo said, whacking me on the back. I started breathing again, but there was no sign of the hiccups returning.

The next afternoon I decided it was time to escape for awhile. The pirate raid had come up again after the domino game and apparently it was scheduled to go in the next day or two. I thought we'd just battled pirates, but was told that a raiding trip was nothing like a pirate battle was. I was told that the end result, being hacked into little pieces, could be the same which didn't seem quite fair.

I wandered to the middle of a large meadow that wasn't too far from Hangman's Tree and proceeded to fall over backwards, letting the tall grass and moss catch me. I lay there with a big grin on my face as the sun warmed me through the bear pelt and I drifted close to slumbering. Right before I fell asleep, I felt something on my nose and opened my eyes to see a butterfly on my nose. I wrinkled my nose a couple of times and it took off. I drifted back towards the Land of Nod once again and had the same thing happen. After repeating this for three or four times I finally sat up and brushed it way with my hands. I watched as it fled into the air and flew across the meadow for parts unknown. With a sigh of contentment I lay back down.

"Aw, c'mon. This is ridiculous," I yelled as once again I felt the butterfly land on my nose. I blew it off only to have it land once more on the same place. I stood up and stared at the butterfly which was now hovering right in front of me at eye-level. I took a step back as it stuck its tongue out at me. That surprised me since I didn't know that butterflies had tongues or could stick them out like that. I probably shouldn't have gotten so upset but I took off chasing the butterfly across the meadow.

I don't gallop real fast compared to the rest of the guys, but I figured I should at least be able to catch a butterfly. It stayed just out of reach of my paws and flew faster and faster as I speeded up. Finally I just collapsed in the grass gasping to catch my breath. The butterfly hovered out of reach, stuck out its tongue again and flew off. I waited a few more minutes, looking around, but this time it was gone for good. I lay back on the grass and started daydreaming.

"Urgggggggghhhhh!" I growled as my nose tickled once more. I leapt to my feet, grabbed my club, and started chasing the butterfly while swinging the club. Either the butterfly was faster than I thought or the club shorter because I missed with every swing. The butterfly went the length of the meadow and flew into the woods. I followed continuing to swing as hard as I could. The butterfly flew over a creek and I galloped through it, my left pawmoc now squishing with every other step I took. There was a briar patch and a hill and then we were racing downhill on a path where I passed Red and Surefoot who were looking at me in amazement.

"Cubby's chasing something," Red said to Surefoot.

"Yeah, but what's he chasing? I didn't see anything other than him."

"Pirates I bet. Invisible pirates. He's going to get the treasure all for himself and Pan will name him king for a day."

"Not if I can help it," Surefoot said. He took off, grabbing the slingshot out of his pocket and loading it with a pebble.

"Hey! Wait for me," Red called, running after him. "No way you get the treasure for yourself."

By this time the butterfly and I were a couple hundred feet ahead. I was out of range of the conversation, but was gleefully informed about it later. Both Surefoot and Red were following now and I suddenly saw stars as I was hit in the head with a rock. Surefoot had been trying to hit the 'invisible pirate' I was chasing with his slingshot but as he let fly, the trail rose over a low hill and I ended up in the rock's path. I looked back to see who was shooting at me and didn't see that both trail and butterfly made a turn to the left and ended up galloping into a tree. There was a great scattering of branches, leaves and bark as I bounced off the tree and tumbled through a mud puddle, managing to rip out the seat of the bear pelt. By the time I finished tumbling, I had managed to land back on my feet and was headed back towards Surefoot and Red.

"Oh, crickey," Surefoot yelled and dove off the path. Red was slower and I accidentally ran over him. I slowed down trying to figure out exactly why I was now running in the direction I'd come from when the butterfly zipped past me. With a yell I started galloping faster after it. The butterfly flew off the trail and led a zigzag course through mud puddles, thistle patches, nameless creeks and a fence made out of stone. Surefoot was close on my heels and Red was limping along in a distant third. Fortunately there wasn't a repeat of the slingshot incident.

The butterfly did a couple loop-the-loops and wound up flying up the center of Wolf Creek. I followed, sending up a spray of water on either side and managed to soak Leo and Tigger who were fishing from the bank. They got another soaking as Surefoot followed me. I heard Leo ask Red who I was chasing and heard 'ghost pirates' and 'tons of treasure' yelled. I was way too much out of breath to try and clear that up, so I kept following the butterfly and Leo and Tig made up number three and four, quickly outdistancing Red.

Eventually the others decided it was too hot to go after ghost pirates and that the treasure was probably ghostly as well. They pulled up and watched as I disappeared out of sight, still swinging the club at what I'd decided must be some sort of werebutterfly. We burst out into the meadow where this whole thing had started and the butterfly started flying in circles with me following right behind it. The club swings weren't nearly as enthusiastic as they had been and I managed to hit myself with it a couple of times. The circles the butterfly was making got tighter and tighter and I finally fell over, completely dizzy, the club thumping me on the head as it fell as well. Through the stars I watched as the butterfly hovered above my nose but didn't land. I followed it's flight to a tree that overlooked the meadow and watched as it landed next to Tinker Bell. I watched as they talked for a moment and then Tink flew to where I was still waiting for the ground to stop moving. She gave me a friendly smile and a musical jingle which let me know, I hoped, that we were now even.

I decided now was an excellent time to go back to my nap, and didn't care what landed on my nose. I closed my eyes and hadn't been asleep more than a few seconds when I felt someone shaking me. I opened my eyes to see Red. "What?" I whined.

"We gotta get back to the Tree. The pirate raid is tonight. Peter said that tonight would be the best night since there are invisible pirates roaming around."

"I'd think that would be the best time _not_ to go on a raid," I grumbled as I shakily got to my feet. My feet weren't at all happy about the way they'd been treated and my legs were more than willing to join in any protest that my feet were planning.

"It sure didn't stop you."

"Whadyamean?" I asked Red, wondering what he was going on about.

"You know. Today. When you were running through the woods and ran me down."

I thought as hard as I could and finally the yelling that had been going on between Red and Surefoot to Leo and Tig floated to the surface of my muddled mind. I laughed but it hurt. "That wasn't any invisible pirate. That was a butterfly." We started walking towards Hangman's Tree.

"Wait a second, you were chasing an invisible butterfly to get treasure?"

"Nooooo. The butterfly wasn't invisible, it was in the woods and I guess it flew over you or something."

"Oh," Red said, trying to understand. "Why'd you think it had treasure?"

"I didn't think it had treasure. At least none that I knew about. It might have had some sort of butterfly treasure I guess but I never saw it if it did."

Red pondered on that as we continued towards the Tree. "So why were you chasing it?"

"Because…" I started with and then stopped. I looked at Red who was looking back at me and mumbled an answer under my breath.

"Huh?" I knew Red wouldn't let it go.

"Because it tickled my nose. A lot. Okay?"

"Oh, I see." He said, obviously not seeing at all. "So it tickled your nose… a lot… and you decided to go chasing after it and almost got yourself and me killed. That makes sense."

"You don't get it. Tink paid it or something like that. I saw them talking afterwards and then Tink came and said something to me and smiled."

"She was prob'ly afraid you were going to start chasing her or something. You sure this isn't some sort of joke?"

"It is a joke, but it was played on me." I stopped as I realized something. "Hey, you know what this means? There aren't invisible pirates around so we shouldn't go on the raid tonight." That sounded backwards, but I wasn't going to argue about it. Red shrugged and said that Peter would have to decide that. The rest of the trip to Hangman's Tree was spent with me catching Red glancing over at me as if making sure I wasn't drooling or something. I don't think he believed me about the butterfly and Tinker Bell.

Hangman's Tree was full of activity when we arrived. Unlike the pirate battle, though, there was a lot of laughter and carrying on this time. "So no Lost Boy has ever been hurt or killed during a raid?" I asked hopefully.

"Oh I wouldn't say that," Roo said, passing by. "I've done a lot of stitching after raids. Tink says you're even by the way," he added as he headed off to grab something.

"Ha! I told you I wasn't crazy," I said to Red who'd been listening to Roo too.

"'Wasn't crazy,' but are you crazy now?" He dropped a bucket full of mud that he'd gotten somewhere on the common room table sending a small spray of mud into the air from the force of the landing. "Anyway you need to cover your face with this so you don't show up in the dark. You're a lot bigger than a butterfly."

"That's right, I need to tell Peter that it wasn't pirates but butterflies," I said as I started covering my face with mud. I didn't see him in the common room, but figured I could mention it later.

Red laughed. "I want to be around when you tell him about that. It ought to be fun to watch." He started slathering mud on himself. "You missed a spot on your chin," Red advised, giving the mud on my face a critical look. He reached into the bucket, grabbed a handful and chucked it at me. "There, that's better." I wiped the mud out of my eyes and asked him if he didn't want me to make sure his teeth didn't show up too much. "Naw, that's okay. I'm good. You gotta remember I've had a lot more practice with this than you have."

He was right about that, but it didn't stop me from gathering a ball of mud myself and letting fly with it. In a few moments, the common room was filled with flying mud and the sound of splats as they found their, usually, intended targets. "Leo opened his mouth and started asking if we were ready to go in a loud bellow. A certain ball of mud found its mark and Leo did get his teeth darkened, along with his tongue and the inside of his mouth. He let out a growl, grabbed the mud bucket and started chasing his brother around the common room, both of them laughing so hard they could hardly run in a straight line. Leo finally caught up with Tig and proceeded to dump the bucket over him. Tig had already been so mud covered that it was hard to see any difference. He'd also been careful to clamp his mouth shut before the deluge.

Leo asked again if we were ready to go. Each boy checked his gear to make sure he had everything and called out that he was ready. I knew I had my club and made sure I had the coil of rope I'd been given to wrap around my middle and sang out that I was ready too. It was just past the witching hour and we were headed to _The Jolly Roger_ again. I still couldn't believe we were heading back there so soon. "This is totally different," Red had explained to me when he noticed I'd turned a little green when I'd heard about it. "That was a battle against pirates. This is a raid against pirates. There's tons of difference between the two."

Tigger had nodded enthusiastically. "They won't know we're coming, for one thing. For another we'll be in disguise and we go in the middle of the night when they'll be sleeping."

"Plus they just came back from plundering somewhere so we can plunder their plunder. It's only fair," Surefoot had added, then whispered, "and maybe they'll have some of those oysters in a can with the key or something else that'd be good to eat."

I still wasn't sure about the whole thing, but climbed out of my trapdoor as the rest of the boys climbed out of thier's. We formed up in front of Hangman's Tree and started off towards Pirate's Cove. We had hardly started before Red started telling Tigger to stop looking at him.

"I ain't looking at you."

"How can you tell he's looking at you. I can't even see my hand in front of my face," Surefoot said.

"Is your hand in front of your face?" Red asked. "No," Surefoot replied. "So of course you can't see it. That doesn't prove nothing. Stop looking at me."

"Aw, you can't even see him, so how do you know he's looking at you?"

"How do you know he isn't? I can just tell. He drives me crazy when he does that."

"I'm on the other side, anyway," Tigger's voice said from the other side, which caused some laughter immediately followed by Tigger complaining that someone was stepping on his tail.

"Don't look at me," Red said. "I'm on the other side, remember?"

"I'm not supposed to be looking at you anyway." The jokes went downhill from there.

As we got close to the cove, the jokes and occasional yelling stopped, but the mood was still more of fun to be had than the dread fear of before. We cautiously walked out onto the beach and stood there while Leo took a look with the telescope he'd brought. There was enough of a moon to provide a fair amount of light once we'd left the woods, but that didn't seem to concern anyone but me. "It must have been a good trip, there's not a soul on watch. Bet the Cap'n doesn't know about it or he'd have Smee keel-hauled along with the rest of the crew," he murmured as he swept the glass from bow to stern. "There's not a light to be seen." Leo closed the telescope and replaced it in a pelt pocket.

"How do we get out there?" I asked, noticing there weren't any rowboats around like last time.

"That's easy. We just use the raft. C'mon and lend a hand." Me, Leo, Tig, and Roo followed him to where the woods meet the beach and watched as he moved palm fronds, leaves, and a variety of other stuff exposing a wooden raft. With a lot of tugging, pulling and lifting we finally managed to get it into the water. I felt like I'd gotten a dozen splinters in my hands.

"Okay, remember guys, on and off as quick as you can. They may have had a bit too much rum, but that'll make 'em really cranky if they wake up. Whose gets Hook's cabin this time?" There was a chorus of "me, me, me" in answer to Leo's question. "You know we should give the new kid a chance," he said looking at me with a grin.

"Uh, maybe next time," I said, sure I didn't want to see Captain Hook awake or asleep.

"You go this time," Leo told Surefoot causing a couple of groans.

"What should I do?" I hadn't ever plundered before and wasn't sure what the proper procedure was or what I should be grabbing.

Leo looked at Tig who shrugged. "You take the stern of the boat." I gave him a blank look. "The back end. You might get lucky and find something there and they'll be less pirates to worry about. Just grab anything that looks good. Treasure, coins, weapons, whatever. Grab it and head back to the raft."

"Hey Cub, if you see anything edible, be sure and grab that too, but don't eat it."

"I heard that," came Stumble's voice.

"I did too," I added.

We got on the raft which didn't seem nearly as large or as sturdy as it seemed it should have been for it's weight. Leo and Tig paddled with Red sort of steering with a board he used as a rudder. There was more splashing than rowing, but we eventually got to the side of the boat. Red unwound the rope I'd been carrying and tied a couple of boards to the end that Leo casually pulled off of the raft. "Ha! Who needs a grappling hook?" he said to no one in particular. I watched as Red made a few practice swings and then threw it towards the rail above. The first time it slipped and almost beaned Roo. The second time it held. "Okay, Cubbs, on your way."

"Me?"

"Sure. If it'll hold you, it'll hold all of us."

"Me?" I repeated even though I couldn't fault his logic.

"He's right," Tig said. "What if he falls?"

"Fine, you go first," Leo said, beginning to sound a little exasperated about things. Tig laughed and started up the rope, but stopped about a foot above us. "Did you bring the stuff?" he asked Red. Red nodded and held up a couple of feathers and a bottle of something. Tig gave a huge grin and continued up the rope and went over the rail. After a moment he signaled down that the coast was clear. Stumble was delegated to stay with the raft so it wouldn't drift off and the rest of us swarmed up the rope to the deck. I didn't swarm quite as fast as the others but finally made it.

By the time I arrived on deck, the rest of the boys had already scattered and were exploring to see what could be plundered. Whatever I expected it wasn't this. We had the run of the deck. There wasn't a single pirate around. At least not one that was upright. There was a bunch of piratey looking lumps on the desk that were snoring. A couple were humming in a drowsy sort of way and from far below came the sound of laughter. I started towards the back of the ship on tiptoe when my heart tried to jump out of my throat as I almost tripped over a pirate lying on the deck in front of me. I was only slightly calmed when he let out a huge snore. Carefully stepping over him, I continued on until I was at the stern of the ship. There wasn't much to be seen except for a small hatch in the deck, locked with a huge brass padlock. I stood there for a moment debating with myself whether I should pass it by or not. I didn't have anything with me except my club and trying to beat it off might attract attention. Shivering I tiptoed back to where the pirate was still snoring on deck. I was either in luck or out of it, depending on how you looked at it, by the discovery of a large dagger in a sheath strapped to his leg. I stood there forever trying to get the tiny, fragmented pieces of my courage together. With one hand I held the club up in the air, ready to strike, while I slowly eased the dagger out of its sheath with the other. I got it about halfway out when the pirate's eyes flew open. "Teddy bear?" he asked, getting a silly grin on his face before the eyes rolled back up into his head. I held my breath until he started snoring again and finished removing the dagger and returned to the locked hatch.

That padlock may have been huge, but it was no match for the dagger. After two attempts of leveraging the hasp with the dagger, it snapped off with a loud ping leaving the hatch unlocked. I opened the hatch all the way up so it lay on the deck and went through it, not sure what I expected to find. Enough moonlight spilled through the opening above me that I could see there was almost nothing to be seen. It was a small room with a single wooden chair and a table in it. I wondered if it was like a brig or something. The ceiling wasn't too far from the floor and I dragged the chair to below the opening so I could climb back out. There wasn't any noise from the deck above which made me glad that the pirates hadn't awakened and terrified that I might be the last Lost Boy on board. I was standing on the chair when I noticed a parcel in one of the corners of the room. Figuring something was better than nothing, I jumped off the chair, grabbed it and went back to exiting. Once I got back on deck, I ripped the paper off what it was covering. There wasn't enough light to tell what it was but it felt like a blanket or something which made me wonder even more if that place was _The Jolly Roger's_ brig.

I breathed a sigh of relief to see that my club was still where I'd left it, along with the dagger, next to the hatch opening. I started back towards where the rope was when I came across the sleeping pirate again. Only this time the pirate wasn't alone. Standing over him with one of the feathers was Red. I watched as he dipped the feathered end of the feather into a bottle, pulled it out, and applied it to the pirate's face very carefully. There was enough moonlight on deck to see that the pirate now had a very ornate mustache with a lot of curlicues. "India ink," Red whispered to me. "The ones that already had moustaches are raccoons now." He added a finishing swirl, admired his handiwork, and capped the bottle. "We better get going," he said unnecessarily and headed towards the escape rope with me following. I was almost to the side when I found a small cloth bag. I picked it up and felt something jingle inside of it. Figuring that this probably wasn't the best time or place to check it out, I shoved it in a pocket and continued to the rail.

I went down the rope a little too fast and almost ended up overturning the raft. Red and I were the last arrivals and we shoved off from the side of the ship immediately, leaving the rope still attached to the rail and swinging in the wind as if waving goodbye to us. There wasn't a lot of stuff on the raft. Someone had managed to grab a ham, there were a few jars and cans of things, including a can of oysters with a key, and even some gemstones that threatened to roll overboard as the raft rocked back and forth. I'd grabbed the only dagger, but Surefoot had gotten a cutlass.

"You think ham stew would be any good if you added fish to it?" Stumble asked aloud. There were groans and some gagging sounds made at that possibility.

Red looked at my bundle of material curiously. "What you got there?"

"I dunno. I think it's some sort of blanket from the brig."

Roo shook his head. "Couldn't be, we didn't go below decks far enough to reach the brig and Hook don't normally keep prisoners long enough to need the brig." I explained about the hatchway and breaking the lock as Roo took the material and shook it out. There was immediate silence. "This isn't a blanket, it's a Lost Boy's pelt."

"That's impossible," Leo finally blurted out as though he was stunned. "We ain't missing a Lost Boy and haven't since forever. There's some that went to the next adventure, but we got both them and their pelts back whenever it happened."

"What type is it?" Stumble asked.

"It looks like a leopard skin. I didn't even know Lost Boys came in leopard."

"I didn't either. I ain't even thought about leopard before." As we drifted towards the beach, there was a lot of discussion about the pelt and where it had come from, why it was on _The Jolly Roger_ and most importantly, who had it belonged to.

"You're supposed to be the one who keeps track of all this stuff," Tig said to Stumble. "You ever hear about a leopard before?"

"Not me. Maybe Nibbler knows something about it. Least he oughta be able to tell us if they went to the next adventure."

"I'm glad it was you who found it and not me," Surefoot said as we started unloading the raft.

"Maybe I oughta just loose it or something."

Leo and Surefoot discussed that for a moment until Leo shook his head. "Naw, it wouldn't be fair to whoever it belonged to. We gotta find out about it."

"Maybe Peter can tell us," I said as I helped re-hide the raft.

"Don't bet on it," Surefoot declared. "I have a feeling this is one of those secret things."

On the trip back to Hangman's Tree I suddenly remember the small cloth bag I'd found and pulled it out of my pocket. It was too dark to tell exactly what they were, but they felt like some sort of coin, but not big enough or heavy enough to be doubloons, eagles, crowns or anything like that. That was pretty cool because we needed something different for checker pieces. They felt sort of funny in my hand, though, like they were vibrating or something. That could mean magic or it could mean they were trying to eat my hand, in which case they wouldn't be good for checker pieces. I put them back in the bag and back in my pocket.

When we got back to the Tree, I carefully folded up the pelt and stuck it in the chest by my pallet. Something was going to have to be done about it, but I didn't know what yet. No one else had mentioned it since we'd left the raft which seemed weird since everyone had been so concerned about it. Before I could do anything about that, though, there was something really important to do. I joined the stampede of boys around Stumble so I could grab some ham before it vanished in some sort of bizarre stew-like substance.


	12. Chapt 12: Hunting Snipe & Finding Wolves

"So what are we going to do about it?" I asked Red, who was busy thinning the elastic on the slingshot he'd 'borrowed' from Tig's hammock.

"Do what about what?" He made another shallow swipe with the knife and then held the slingshot in front of my face so I could look at it. "You think Tig would be able to tell this'd break if he pulled it back?"

"Tig might not be able to but I bet Leo could."

Red took the slingshot out of my face and shrugged. "Leo likes a good joke. What was that other thing you were talking about?"

"The pelt. Remember? The one I found on _The Jolly Roger_? No one knows nothin' about it. We gotta find out who it belonged to and why it was on Hook's ship. I asked Stumble if he'd remembered anything but he didn't. He did tell me a bunch of cool stories about other things."

Red nodded absently as he thinned a little more elastic off the slingshot. "Course we have to find out whose it is. How are you going to do it?"

"Me? What're you asking me for? I don't even know where to begin." I started pacing back and forth in front of him. "It was on _The Jolly Roger_, so maybe whoever it was got held prisoner or something. I dunno. Maybe there was a big battle and whoever it belonged to lost it during that."

"Aw, c'mon Cubbs. Don't ya think Stumble'd know if there'd ever been a Lost Boy who ended up fighting in his skivvies during a pirate battle?" Red took another critical look at the slingshot and then apparently satisfied, shoved it into one of his pockets. "Maybe you should ask Nibbler. He might be able to tell you who it belonged to."

I stopped pacing as I thought about Nibbler. I'd met him the first day I'd arrived on the island. He claimed to be a Lost Boy and was dressed in a rabbit pelt but I'd never seen him sense that first time. He didn't hang out in Hangman's Tree, which seemed a little weird, and hadn't been part of any of the games, raids, or battles we'd been in. "Who is Nibbler?" I asked, remembering that he'd told me to ask Red about him.

Red let out a sigh. "Nibbler was… is a Lost Boy who kinda went on to the next adventure. He sorta helps those of us who go onto the next adventure find where they're supposed to go and help them from being scared and stuff like that. That big field where you saw him is Lost Boys' Field and that's where… you know." He shrugged and looked uncomfortable. Lost Boys didn't usually grow up but that didn't mean that other stuff couldn't happen to them either. Most Lost Boys considered themselves immortal up to the time it got proven they weren't.

"Nibbler's a ghost?" That explained a couple of things, like how hard it was to focus on him and the fact he seemed to know a lot about me and that he suddenly vanished. It was hard to believe I'd been talking to a ghost though. I figured I'd have been a lot more cowardly about such a thing.

"No. Yes. Sort of. I don't know. It's kind of complicated. He might be able to tell you something about the pelt. At least who it belonged to, maybe."

"So do I just show up by that tree again or what?"

"Just wander down there and he'll show up unless he's busy or something. But not now. There's something else you have to do."

"Yeah, like I'd really go down there now," I said as I looked at how far the sun had sunk towards the trees. Even if I wasn't scared of my own shadow, I'm pretty sure that the next to the last place I'd want to be after dark was Lost Boys' Field. "And what's this thing I have to do tonight? Hey! It's not firefly tag is it?" I grinned at the thought. Firefly tag was pretty awesome even though I had a tendency to run into things at full gallop. The last time we'd played, I'd even managed to find what had to have been the only cactus on the island. I rubbed my arm in remembrance of where Roo had pulled the needles out of it. I started towards Hangman's Tree with Red following me.

"Naw, that's not 'til a couple of days. Tonight you have to go on a snipe hunt."

I stopped so fast that Red ran into me. "You got to be kidding," I said looking back at where he was picking himself off the ground from the collision. "Not even I'm dumb enough to go on a snipe hunt. Be real."

"Are you kidding?" he asked in disbelief, or a pretty good imitation of it. "Snipes really do exist here. They're furry, wander around the island at night, and they leave this weird looking diamond pattern track."

"Yeah, they exist just like when you follow Tigger's rules for 'King of the Hill' you get a penalty if you lift your left foot off the ground first." Tigger had a lot of variations to the rules of the games we played. They normally came without warning and left carnage behind them. At least they did if you were on the opposite team. I was pretty sure you couldn't get 'kinged' in chess, but it was interesting to see what happened when you did. "Besides, even if they are real here, and I'm not saying they are at all, why do they have to be hunted?" I started walking again.

"You learned about how well we and the elves get along, right?" I nodded. "The reason we hunt them is because it's something we do for the elves."

"The elves. Yeah, right. They need us to hunt these things even though they have about a thousand trackers and scouts and rangers and all those guys. They can see in the dark and Leo says they have pine sap instead of blood and they need _us_ to track these things. Tell me another one."

"It's true. Really. Ask anyone when we get back. Snipes have some sort of magic to prevent them from being tracked but we're immune to it. They're tracks practically glow in the dark for Lost Boys but elves can't see them at all. It's one of those magical sort of curse things I guess."

"Sure it is," I muttered to myself. "So why do the elves need us to track these snipe things?"

"I just told you. They can't…"

"No," I interrupted. "I mean what do they use them for? Why find out where they are at all? They did in their gardens like big moles or something?"

"Naw. That's not it at all. They want us to hunt them so we can take their pelts so no one else can have them. If you make a hat out of a snipe pelt and wear it, elven magic won't work on you and you'll be invisible to the elves too. It's written down." I came to another sudden stop. "Darn it Cubbs. Would you quit doing that?" Red asked as he got off the ground again from this collision.

"You mean I gotta go hunt these snipes and when I find them we kill them so we can get their pelts? No way I'm doing that." Somewhere a cricket chirped as if in agreement.

"Naw, that's not it at all. The reason you have to hunt them tonight is cuz the moon is full and it's spring. When those two things are together for the first time, the snipes shed their pelt like a snake because they don't need them no more. I guess they get hot or something. All you have to do is follow them to the shedding place and pick up what they've left behind. And before you ask, it's a new place each year and hidden really good so it's impossible to find if you don't follow them to it."

Once again we started off towards the Tree while I thought about the dozens of holes in this story. "What's this about 'me,'" I suddenly asked. "How come I have to do it?"

"That's easy. It's because you're the newest."

"Oh." I was absolutely positive that this whole thing was a joke now but didn't say anything more about it until we got to Hangman's Tree. We each took our own trapdoors in and slid down into the common room. As normal, Red landed on his feet and I somehow tumbled coming off the slide and landed on my rump.

"Cubby the Fearless. It is about time you arrived." I shook the few remaining stars floating around my head from the landing away and looked to see Peter sitting on his throne, the rest of the Lost Boys standing at attention around him. He'd never called me fearless before which made me scared. "Has Red the… the… Oh, fie. Has Red told you what you have to do tonight?"

"You mean the snipe hunt?"

"Exactly so. Only the bravest of the brave and the most stout-hearted of lads can perform this duty."

"That lets him out," I heard Surefoot whisper to someone.

"I dunno, I think he got stout covered," was Tig's whispered response." I vowed some form of revenge on Surefoot but couldn't on Tig because he was just getting even with me for putting a bunch of month-old blueberries in his bedding the other night. I probably should have used strawberries or raspberries since I might as well have told him I did it by using blueberries.

"Uh, Red told me I had to do it because I was the newest," I told Peter.

"Well, yeah. There's that too, but the other stuff sounds more exciting." He got up from the throne and stood in front of me. "Cubby the Fearless I bid you to go out and find snipe pelts and bring them back so we can give them to the elves. Any questions?" I opened my mouth. "Good. I knew you'd understand."

Peter did a quick inspection, told Roo that he looked like he might be growing up and better be careful about that and then took off. I stood in the common room trying to figure out what had just happened. Nothing good, I was pretty sure. I finally gave up on that and asked Red what I was supposed to do.

"I thought you thought this was just all a big joke," Red said with an 'I told you so' type grin. "Snipes don't exist and if they do we certainly don't need snipe coats." He went on in that vein for a few minutes while he grinned so I knew not to take it personally. I still wondered whether it was a joke or not, but Peter normally didn't get involved in such things unless he was the one who'd come up with it. The best part and worst part about being in Neverland was the 'impossible' stuff that could happen there. I could never tell when someone was joking about something and a lot of the time when I was sure they were, it turned out they weren't. I'd floated on clouds, flown through the air, met elves, so I couldn't say for sure snipes didn't exist. Just like I couldn't say for sure that Tigger was only joking when he told me that someplace on the island was a hollow tree where elves made chocolate chip cookies. I'd looked long and hard for that one with no luck yet.

"Yeah, I know. You win," I conceded when Red started to run down. "So what do I have to do?"

"Snipes are shy critters and magical too. So only one person can hunt them. You have to take some pixie dust and rub it on your nose and that way you'll be able to see their tracks."

"I thought we could see them because they're tracks glowed in the dark for us."

"They usually do, but only if you rub pixie dust on your nose. Sometimes even with the pixie dust they'll kind of fade to regular tracks. It doesn't work if anyone else does it, so only Lost Boys can track them. The next thing is that their trail has a sort of spell cast on it. You have to follow their tracks exactly. If you try to take a shortcut or you go around a tree one way when the tracks go around another, they'll vanish and you have to start over again. Finally, the tracks will only show up for you before the Unicorn Star sets. Once it vanishes, the tracks can't be followed."

"Then what? When I finally get to the end?"

"No worries. All you do then is collect their pelts and bring them back here. They'll be laying around on the ground where they shed them. But if you don't get them before the Unicorn Star goes down, they'll turn to dust."

I'd watched Red the entire time he'd been telling me this stuff, trying to see if this was real or the whole thing was a huge joke. He'd been serious and solemn the entire time which meant it could be either one. "You're serious about all this, aren't you? I mean you wouldn't lie to me being my best friend and all."

"I can't believe you'd say I'd joke about something like this," Red said, a hurt expression moving across his face. "Ask Peter if you don't believe me. Or Tig or Leo." I apologized for doubting him, which brought the normal grin back to his face. At the same time it didn't escape me that he really hadn't answered my question. Leo, being the best tracker, was going to show me where the snipe trail began. After that, I was on my own as tradition and the snipe's supposed shyness demanded. I grabbed my wooden sword, an empty bag to put the snipe pelts in, a small bag of pixie dust that Surefoot gave me, and a few marbles from my wooden chest. I was also given a lantern full of fireflies to light my way even though there was a full moon out. "You'll probably need it," Red explained. "Snipes go into some awfully dark places."

With that happy thought bumping through my muddled mind, Leo led me from Hangman's Tree through the woods. Even in the middle of the woods the moonlight streaming from above was bright enough to provide enough light to see halfway decently. It also caused every shadow on earth to show up where we were walking and turning them into all sorts of threatening shapes. If you're scared of your own shadow, chances are really good you're going to be terrified of shadows that don't belong to you. After a bunch of twists and turns we ended up in a part of the woods I don't think I'd ever been to and were standing in front of what had to be the biggest bramble patch ever. "Put the dust on your nose," Leo whispered.

"Why are you whispering?" I whispered back as I dipped a finger in the bag of pixie dust and rubbed it across my nose. For the next couple of minutes I had a sneezing fit. When I finally stopped, I asked him about the whispering again.

"So they won't hear us."

"Who won't here us? The snipes?"

"No, snipes don't listen to anything," Leo answered. "Do you see the snipes' trail?"

I looked around even though I was more concerned with what non-snipe thing wasn't supposed to be hearing us. "Is that it?" I said, spying a bunch of diamond shape tracks that were glowing in the darkness and started from the exact center of the briar patch.

Leo peered where I was pointing and finally nodded. "Yeah, that's them. Wait, you can't do that."

Not really wanting to wade into the middle of a bunch of briars, I'd started to go around it to join the tracks where they left the patch. Leo's warning wasn't really necessary because as soon as I'd taken a step to go around, the tracks had faded from view. I walked back towards Leo and the tracks slowly reappeared again. "You're not serious," I complained. "I have to go through the middle of that?"

"Sorry, Cubbs," Leo whispered back. "Good luck. You can do it."

He started back towards the Tree. I suddenly realized I still didn't know what was causing us to whisper. I was definitely not going to yell at Leo to come back so I could ask him either.

I looked at the tangle of briars, sighed, and started wading through them. The pelt is pretty thick and I only yelped in pain a few times as I pushed my way through the mess of thorns. By the time I got to the center of the pile where the tracks started, I had tiny cuts on my hands, arms and face and it felt as though the bear pelt were full of little splinters. Somehow a thorn or splinter had gotten caught in such a manner that every time I moved the right way, it poked my side. The going from where the tracks began to the other end of the briar patch was a lot easier to get through. The briars were all torn and crushed as though something heavy had crashed through them. I stopped and considered that for a moment. I hadn't asked, and no one had volunteered, exactly how big a snipe was. I'd figured it was maybe the size of a squirrel or something like that, but what if it was the size of a horse or an elephant or even a dragon? I wondered what would happen if I caught up with it. Were they calm creatures or would they try to tear me limb-from-limb and would they be big enough to be able to do that? I double checked that I still had my wooden sword and started tracking again.

At first there wasn't anything to following the tracks. They kind of meandered through the woods and looped back over themselves a few times. I tried shortcutting at one of the loops but, as before, the tracks started to vanish when I did. Going back and following them in the order which they'd been done caused them to reappear again. It got to be a little irritating when it took 100 yards of walking to travel 10 yards forward. Even more irritating was when I came to a huge hill. I could only stare at the steep side covered in those stupid triangular tracks. After a sigh and a bit of self-pity, I started following the tracks. I was about ¾ of the way finished when I slipped on some mud and went tumbling down the hill. As soon as I landed at the bottom, the tracks faded away. I tried galloping back up the hill where I thought I'd slipped, but couldn't even manage to locate the patch of mud. Mumbling all sorts of words that I'd been told dwarves used, I trudged back to where the part of the hill where the trail had begun. Like magic the tracks slowly reappeared and I started following them all over the hill again. This time I made it without any problem, although it took longer, and finally stood at the hill's summit. I was covered in more dirt than usual, had the thorn sticking in my side, and was panting so loudly that they probably could have heard me anywhere on the Island.

On the other side of the hill the tracks quit messing around and took off in a straight line. A straight line that went down a slope that was so steep it could probably be called a cliff. A straight line that went in a mud bog on one side and came out on the opposite side. A straight line that vanished into the waters of the Big Bear River. There is only one way to go down a slope that's almost as steep as a cliff. Leo or Surefoot would have you believe you need a bunch of rope to climb down it. Red would say that you should use pixie dust to try and float down. Stumble would say the best thing to do would be go around until you found a less steep place. I knew what the true answer was. I went to the edge of the slope where the tracks went down stepped over and dropped on my rump. I yelled on the way down, but it was more fun than fear. At the bottom I discovered I'd skinned both hands and there was a long rip down one of the bear pelt's legs. I was pretty sure there would be some bruising as well. I was at the bottom, right in front of the bog. That didn't present any problem at all as I just tromped right through it splashing mud all over. The river gave me a few scary moments. Fortunately it wasn't running too fast and I only thought I was going to drown twice before getting to the other side because I had to keep the lantern out of the water while almost all of me was in the water. Hauling myself out of the river, I started following the tracks as they led back into the woods.

A couple hundred yards brought me to a tree. It was the most average looking pine tree in the world except for the snipe tracks. The tracks led to the tree and then went up the tree. Not branch-to-branch, but up the side of the trunk. No one had told me anything like that was possible. Of course I didn't know where snipe dens were usually located. For all I know snipes could have nests in trees. I knew I'd try to live in a tree if I were a snipe and lived in a forest full of big critters. I had to put the handle of the lantern between my teeth cuz I couldn't hold it while I was climbing. I took a deep breath and started climbing, following the tracks up to almost the top of the tree. They finally followed a thin branch that didn't seem to lead to anything. I followed as far as I could, the branch bending dangerously under my weight. "Aw c'mon. That's impossible," I told the night as I picked out the fact that the tracks extended beyond the branch I was on and were floating in mid-air. There was a rustling in the woods from below that had been pretty much continuous since I'd entered them and I hoped it was just some tiny critters doing their regular night things and not the things that weren't supposed to hear me, so I tried to ignore it. I couldn't see where the tracks went and knew it was no use to try and follow on the branch I was on.

Figuring retreat was the best option, I tried slowly turning around on the branch. It didn't appreciate it and began to creak alarmingly. Next I tried to back down the branch. That was no better and in an instant I was hanging upside down from the branch like some sort of sloth. The firefly lantern was now against my face and I couldn't see anything. I began trying to move towards the trunk again when the branch let me know it'd had enough. There was a crack like a rifle shot and the lantern was no longer a problem because I was falling towards the ground. I'm not sure how many limbs and branches I bounced off of, but when I finally reached the bottom, it seemed like there were a lot more stars than there had been earlier. As I waited for the moving stars to go away, I thought I heard someone laughing but after listening closely figured out it must have been the wind through the pine boughs.

I finally got to my feet and retrieved the lantern, which was amazingly still in one piece. The fireflies didn't appear to be very happy with their treatment, but all of them were still flashing. I held it up as high as I could and by squinting saw that the floating tracks seemed to lead to another tree. Sure enough, when I got to the trunk of the other tree, I found the weird tracks going back to ground and heading through the woods again. With a sigh, I took off after them again. The behavior of the tracks was really weird. There wasn't any rhyme or reason as to the direction they took. They'd go up an impossibly steep hill when not ten feet away was a much easier way to get up the hill. They doubled and tripled back on themselves. They'd go straight up the side of a ridge and switchback in a straight level area between the trees. One thing I did discover about snipes was that they seemed to love going to the most shadowy places possible. If there was an area of the woods that had some moonlight or starlight peeking through the canopy above, the tracks changed course and went through the darkest, most shadowy route available.

It was while going through one of the blackest areas of shadow that I absolutely lost it. The snipe trail led between two trees that were very close together. Extremely close. I'll be the first to admit that I'm not built to go between two trees that are very close together. It seemed to take forever and I ended up having to climb a couple of feet up one of them in order to squeeze between them. I'd ended up carrying the firefly lantern between my teeth again and was climbing back down when I sneezed without warning. The lantern went careening towards the ground and I watched in dismay as the door flew open when it hit bottom. The fireflies were stunned for an instant, but then rapidly left both lantern and woods leaving me in darkness. It was more falling than climbing down, but I reached the forest floor and collapsed against one of the tree trunks, panting. I looked around, but couldn't see anything. The rustling of brush that had followed me throughout this forest continued. The darkness was growing and was getting ready to swallow me up. I pulled out the wooden sword and tried to look what I thought was menacing but probably more resembled a teddy bear with an oversized knitting needle. The sounds in the woods grew louder and I heard a keening sound that was both heart-breaking and terrifying. The rustling got louder and louder and I knew that I was going to be another Lost Boy who disappeared on a snipe hunt. I screamed.

Screaming is something I can do very well. When you're the most cowardly Lost Boy, it's sort of a given that screaming well is going to be one of your major talents. It goes along with being able to gallop faster than any other Lost Boy can run (but only happens when you're terrified and not when you're trying to avoid being tagged) and being able to imagine the most wildly improbable reasons for sounds, visions, or anything else presented. This time, though, something went wrong. I had opened my mouth and let fly a scream of absolutely perfectly epic proportions. Maybe it was cuz my teeth were chattering or I was getting ready to cough or the pixie dust was tickling my nose again or something like that. Whatever the reason the scream that started in my lungs got mixed up in my throat and came out as a perfect howl. It was so real, I managed to scare myself with it. The upside was that it was such a surprise, I sat there in the leaves for a moment trying to figure out what had happened and forgot to be scared at all.

The fear slammed back when the howl was answered by something that sounded way too close. I surged up to my feet and took off galloping as fast as I could. This only lasted for a second because there was still that problem of being unable to see anything, including the tree in front of me. I bounced off the tree with the front of my head, tried to select a new direction, got my feet tangled up in the wooden sword (which should be impossible but which I managed very nicely), and fell backwards hitting the back of my head this time. My consciousness decided it'd had more than enough of this whole fear/pain thing and fled, leaving me to take a quick nap.

I woke up to discover something was eating my face. My face was covered in slobber and I could feel the creature probing it looking for the best place to take its first bite. The thought started running through my head, "I'm going to die. I'm going to die. I'm going to die." I think I may have whimpered right before begging the creature not to eat me.

*You're kind of funny,* a voice in my head said in a dry, laughing tone. *We don't eat those of the Pack Who Are Not Found. Are you feeling more of whole?* I realized rather sheepishly that the eating I thought was being done was actually only something licking my face. Kind of like a puppy. Still, I didn't know that it wasn't trying to lure me into letting down my guard. This time I laughed because the thought of something having to go to the trouble of making a big clumsy person such as myself let down their guard was… laughable.

"Who are you?" I asked as I slowly sat up. I got dizzy for a moment, but it passed.

*I'm Ember of the Pack Who Are By The River Where It Falls Shortly.* The feeling of the words turned to curiosity. *You howled very good for one who does not bound, yet I have not heard you before. You must be new from someplace else recently.*

"Uh, yeah. I'm a new Lost Boy. At least pretty new. My name is Cubby." I was doing my best to be calm and was surprisingly having a lot more success than normal. Yet I still suddenly blurted out, "You're not going to kill me are you?"

There was a long pause. *That is a foolish thought. We are taught that pack mates only do harm to another when leadership or Dire Things are involved. These are things that cubs such as us have no need to concern ourselves with for now. Does not your elders teach you these things?*

"We don't really have elders. Peter might be considered an elder I guess, but he'd sure get mad if you told him that. He's more like a leader than an elder. He doesn't grow up. None of us do. That's part of what bein' a Lost Boy is all about. And none of us would ever try to be the leader. Peter does that cuz he can crow better than the rest of us. That's not the only reason. It's also cuz he rescued us before we would have died in the 'real' world and brought us because…" I wound down because none of us Lost Boys really knew why Peter rescued Lost Boys. We were just eternally grateful that he did. I wasn't sure what had suddenly made me so talkative unless it was the fact that it didn't seem like I was going to be eaten. From Ember came a wave of both things already known and curiosity to my story. Not any words, just a feeling of interest. Somewhere inside my muddled mind a thought finally managed to catch its own tail and a connection was made. "You're a wolf, aren't you?" There was a feeling of acknowledgement from Ember and I went from calm to terrified in less than a second.

Ember's reaction to my terror was immediate. I felt such a wave of total sadness from the wolf cub that tears formed in my eyes and I came close to breaking down completely and wailing. "Ember. No. I didn't mean…" I moved towards where I thought he was standing and managed to ram my chin into his snout which cause him to yelp. I finally managed to get my arms around his neck and buried my face in his fur. "It's not you. I'm… I'm just a cub too. I don't know about the ways of wolves or things like that. I haven't been a Lost Boy real long and I'm just learning stuff." The feeling of sadness coming from Ember lessened. I started to tell him I wanted to be his friend, but that didn't seem right for some reason. Instead I thought about wanting to be his friend and then tried to 'send' it to him. Naturally I wasn't sure what I was doing, but I tried to strain as hard as I could to get the message across to him. I bit my lip and crossed my eyes in the process.

*What are you doing?* he asked with a puzzled feeling.

"Trying to let you know that I want to be friends." I said, removing my face from his neck and getting unsteadily to my feet.

I got the impression of happiness and of a puppy, albeit a huge one, playing with its litter-mates. *I know. I don't understand the tensing of your muscles or why you are chewing on your lips.*

"Oh," I said, embarrassed. "I… Uh, I just wanted to make sure that what I wanted to send made it to you. I wasn't sure if I was doing it right or not." Thoughts of laughter and humor brushed my mind, but it was companionable laughing and not being laughed at. It was the same sort of laughter I shared with the other Lost Boys. We teased each other a lot and none of us were shy about pointing out each other's shortcomings, but it was never mean-spirited and each of us tended to laugh more at ourselves. "I'm pretty much scared of everything," I mumbled, trying to explain my reaction to the discovery he was a wolf. "Even my shadow can be pretty scary."

There was a feeling of understanding. *Sometimes cubs can be fearful of those things which don't easy frighten oldsters. One day I'm going to be the most fearless in my pack and will go on to do Great Things.* The understanding changed back to curiosity. I'd find that was a feeling that Ember gave off a lot. *How is it you find yourself out here though? It does not seem this would be a time or place in which one who was not quite sure of his footing would find themselves.*

I sort of liked being described as not being sure of my footing instead of being scared to death. His question brought back the immediate problem of the snipe hunt. I explained to him what was going on and asked if he knew if the unicorn star had set yet.

*No. The unicorn star is near the end of the sky yet has not gone beyond its bounds as yet.* There was a definite laughter about his words, but I was too concerned to pay any attention beyond noticing it.

"It doesn't matter," I sighed. "I lost the fireflies so I can't even see the tracks anymore."

*Are they the strange three-side tracks? I am able to see them and could lead you to their conclusion.*

I got excited but only for a moment as I remembered Tigger's words. "It wouldn't work. They can tell they're being followed if more than one follows them. Rats."

The feeling of laughter returned. *I am fairly certain such restrictions do not apply to wolves. Mayhap we should try as you would lose nothing if it did not work.* That made sense, so I agreed. Ember had me catch hold of his tail and then started slowly off. I followed him through a winding path that continued to defy any sense or logic. I did discover that he liked to stomp through mud puddles as much as I did and that there were times he could be sort of clumsy too. Like when he slipped on the river bank and we both tumbled into the water. Eventually, though, we came to a large meadow. In the center was a large tree stump that looked vaguely threatening. Ember came to a stop as we stared at the scene. The moon hadn't set yet, and I could see the glowing tracks which led straight to the stump. I glanced up to see the unicorn star perched on the top of a mountain.

"I have to hurry, it's almost too late," I said as I rushed past Ember and ran towards the stump.

*Wait, Cubby. I do not think what you expect to find is what you will find.* Normally I'd have come to a dead stop on hearing those words, but the sending wasn't tinged with concern. It almost felt as though Ember was chocking with barely contained laughter. I grinned too because I figured he was laughing at my gallop across the meadow. Tigger always thought it was funny when I 'ran,' and he was the one who had said that it looked more like a gallop. Besides, there wasn't any time to lose. I knew the Unicorn Star would vanish from the sky at any moment.

I reached the stump in record time (for me) and saw there was a hollow in it that the tracks seemed to disappear into. In a sudden show of bravery, I leaned over, reached my hand into the hollow, felt a pile of fur and pulled it out. My yell of triumph as I stood up got cut off as I saw in the moonlight that it hadn't been loose fur I'd grabbed, but a real, live snipe. Following really close on that thought was the realization that it wasn't a snipe I was holding in my hand, but a skunk. A very unhappy skunk. An extremely irritated, unhappy skunk.

I'm pretty sure it was a trick of the moonlight, but I swear that the skunk looked at me with the evilest of grins before it let fly with that thing that skunks do best. I suddenly couldn't breathe or see anything and sat down hard on my rump as I released my grip on the skunk. I could feel more laughter from Ember, although it wasn't nearly as successfully choked off as it had been earlier, along with a feeling of concern for a pack mate. I heard him howl and listened to what seemed like a half dozen responses. I knuckled my eyes and wiped them with the sleeve of the bear pelt, which didn't smell anything like bear or any other thing but skunk, and was finally able to see blurry images through the tears. I looked to see a number of wolves appear around Ember. They looked to be all ages and ranged from Ember's size, who came up to my stomach, to the height of a small pony. Even more amazing was the fact that they were herding or dragging Lost Boys along with them. Even blurry-eyed and in moonlight I could see the boys' grins, even Roo's. Red looked as though he was trying to decide whether to laugh out loud or look guilty. Laughter won and I was glad that it had.

Tigger explained that during the day while Stumble was regaling me with stories, the rest of them had been busy laying down the snipe tracks. They knew that being a Lost Boy, I could be enthralled for hours when it came to stories. Then Red had given me the snipe hunt details and even Peter had been involved in the joke. When I'd heard rustling in the woods, it had been the rest of the Lost Boys that I was hearing because they naturally wanted to see what would happen and make sure I didn't run into something I couldn't handle without some help. They hadn't counted on the howling, "That was the coolest thing I ever heard," Red said enviously, or that Ember would show up although it hadn't ruined the plans too badly. Especially having dropped the firefly lamp. They also hadn't expected to be rounded up by the wolves although I learned that Lost Boys and wolves played a lot together, especially tag. Ember had smelled the skunk, but also knew I was on a snipe hunt. Apparently wolves had snipe hunts too and he wasn't sure whether it would have been a good thing to stop me or not. Instead he prudently stayed upwind and then respectfully requested that the wolves round up the Lost Boys that he knew were out there.

I grumbled a bit, but was assured of the fact that every Lost Boy since forever had followed snipe tracks to this stump and had gotten sprayed by a skunk. "I don't think it's the same skunk," Surefoot said, "but there's always one there no matter how many times this has been done." "I wasn't lying. It really is a tradition," Tigger added.

I said goodbye to Ember who continued to prudently stay upwind of me. He promised that he'd take me exploring soon and said he knew where a lot of interesting places were. He made interesting sound good.

"So now what?" I demanded after the wolves had left.

Leo held his nose. "Well you sure can't come back to the Tree. You stink, Cubbs."

That fact was one I wouldn't need reminding of. "No joke. How am I going to get rid of it?"

"How do ya normally get rid of stuff you don't want on your pelt?" Tigger asked with a malicious grin.

"I dunno. I guess you…" I stopped as it dawned on me. "No way. I'm not taking a bath. No way. No how. You can't make me."

Red shrugged in an exasperated manner. "We aren't going to tell you that you gotta take a bath." Stumble made a crossing finger gesture against the utterance of the dreaded 'B' word. "But you can't come back into the tree until you don't smell like skunk anymore."

"Fine. I don't care. I'll just live outdoors. I can handle it. You'll see." We started back towards Hangman's Tree, the rest of the boys being careful to stay upwind of me, and arrived at about the same time dawn did. I stayed outside and Stumble brought me some stew for breakfast, although he was careful not to get real close to me.

My resolve lasted for about half a day. I thought I might get used to the smell, but such wasn't the case. Before the afternoon had gotten too far along, I trudged to the swimming hole with soap and brush. I also had tomato juice that Surefoot had gleefully provided me with which he just happened to have borrowed from the Jolly Roger at some point. By the time I'd used the last of the tomato juice, which Surefoot kept supplying, to scrub my pelt and tangled mane, the sun was slanting towards the mountains.

I lay on the gravel beach feeling the sun warm my stomach and chest as it dried the soggy but immaculate and tomato-smelling pelt I was in. Red was whittling a stick of wood nearby, and then turned and asked, "Could you really talk to Ember?"

"I guess so. I could sort of figure out what he was saying in my mind and he seemed to understand me. Can't all Lost Boys speak to wolves?"

"Wellll… sort of. We can catch images and things like that but they're more pictures than words. I wonder if you should have been in a wolf pelt."

I laughed. "Yeah, right. I know why Peter put me in a bear pelt. There probably isn't a wolf pelt big enough to fit me."

Red nodded in that way of his which seemed on the surface to agree with what you were saying but also let you know that he thought he knew something you didn't but wasn't going to tell you about it yet… or ever. "Anyway, you can come back into the Tree now since we don't have to re-christen you 'Stinky'." He got to his feet and reminded me that Stumble probably had stew almost ready.

I closed my eyes as he wandered away. For a long time I pondered if there would be any difference between wearing a bear pelt and a wolf pelt.


	13. Chap 13: Anger, Secrets, and Cowflies

There are a lot of things I hadn't expected when it came to being a Lost Boy. Chores, including latrine duty, was one of them. Another was milk. Drinking milk was the last thing I'd have expected to be doing as a Lost Boy. It seemed so… "real" world for some reason. I mean in stories of great adventures and quests or books about elves or dwarves, you never read where someone was told to drink their milk before they set off. Still, Roo insisted that we have a couple of servings a week whether it be cow, goat, or some other type better not mentioned. Most of the time it was a pain, but there were a few times it could work out real well.

I sat at the table concentrating on the stew in the gourd in front of me trying not to burn my fingers again and watching Red as he ate. The timing for this was going to have to be almost perfect. Red finished his stew and then started on a huge gourd of today's milk which was goat. He liked milk a lot and always gulped it down when he finished his stew. I looked over at Surefoot and gave him a tiny nod.

"This milk tastes gross," Surefoot loudly declared after taking a swallow. "What kind is it?"

Right on cue Stumble spoke up in a matter-of-fact voice, "It's not really milk. I got some water from that pond by the swimming hole and dipped some chalk and some clay and a slug or two in it. I couldn't find any milk and didn't feel like having Roo yell at me like last time."

Red turned a distinct shade of green as he dropped his milk gourd and forcefully ejected the contents of his mouth. He got a lot of distance with it. The milk crossed the table and landed all over Tigger who just happened to be sitting across the table from Red. Tigger looked up, milk dripping from his face and hair, and started to say something to Red until he noticed me at the end of the table devouring my stew. There wasn't anything unusual about me doing that, but it would have been more natural if I'd looked up at the sound of spraying milk.

"Cubby?" Tig asked in a deceptively mild voice.

I looked up, stew dripping off my chin. "What?" I tried to ask in a normal voice. I could feel my face turn red and my voice squeaked. It wasn't fair that I couldn't fake not being involved better than I was able to, especially in situations like this.

Tigger was wiping the milk off his face with his sleeve. "Funny. Very funny." I looked around. Most everyone else thought it was funny. Even Red was grinning while wiping the milk off his face that had exited through his nose instead of his mouth.

"So we're even now, right?" I asked hopefully.

"Even for what?"

"You know. About the snipe hunt and you saying I was stout."

"But you are and the snipe hunt's a tradition so you can't blame that on me. Besides, I was just gettin' you back for the blueberries in my bunk."

"Oh. Yeah." I had forgotten about that. "But, we're even now, right? Right?" I was keeping my paws crossed.

Tigger looked at me a moment and then grinned. "Naw, I don't think so." He glanced over at Stumble. "You and Cub can watch each other's back."

"Me? What'd I do?" Stumble sputtered. "Why do I get blamed for everything?"

Tigger laughed at him as he got up. "No worries. Furball's going to be my main target."

I groaned as he left, although I was a little bit pleased. I'd never pulled a stunt good enough to get his undivided attention. This could be good, at least up to the point where I get covered in bees or ants or up to my neck in dried mud. I finished up my stew and then dropped down under the table where my pallet was. I sighed as I found some of the milk had made it down here too, but figured I probably deserved it. Opening the chest next to my pallet, I took another look at the jaguar pelt I'd found on _The Jolly Roger_. I still hadn't found out anything about it and that was beginning to bug me a lot. I wasn't sure why either.

I carefully put the pelt back and closed the lid. Maybe today would be the day to ask Nibbler about it. Before I could come up with any concrete plans, there was a bunch of commotion in the common room. I tried standing up to see what it was and then slid out from under the table rubbing the new bump on my head to find that Peter had arrived and was sitting on his throne.

"Cubby the Brave," he said with a smirk as he caught sight of me. "I hear you found a snipe. Or maybe it found you. You sure don't smell like one though." I laughed along with the rest of the boys. It seemed a lot funnier now that I didn't smell like skunk.

"Can I ask you something?" I said, walking over to his throne.

"For being a first class snipe hunter and bath taker you may ask a question." There was some groaning at the mention of a bath from the others.

"It's about something I found during a raid on _The Jolly Roger._" Both twins frowned and Red shook his head slightly. Pan seemed slightly curious but that was about it and nodded at me to continue. "There was this place below the floor, uh deck, and I went into it and there was this thing I found." I stopped, suddenly worried. Red was shaking his head even harder.

"What thing? C'mon out with it." Peter wasn't the most patient person in the world, especially if he suspected that you were stalling which I'd started to.

"Well there was this thing in there and at first I thought it was a blanket because it was all soft like one and in a paper package, but then I opened it and…"

"And?" Peter demanded. Surefoot winced in sympathy and the twins were worriedly whispering to each other. To avoid looking at Peter, I stared at his throne instead. It wasn't really a throne, but a very big rough wooden chair with large arms and a huge back that was stuck in a small alcove in one of the dirt walls of the common room. If you squinted, it looked just like a throne. There was a legend that Pan had either won it, stolen it, or fought for it from or against a pirate king that was before Hook's time. I was wondering how anyone could have ever managed to bring it through one of the trapdoors when there was an impatient cross between a throat-clearing and a growl.

"It was a pelt," I whispered, knowing it was too late to say anything else. Even being the most cowardly Lost Boy didn't prepare me for the sudden urge of wanting to throw up. "A jaguar pelt. I just wondered if you knew who it belonged to." The question didn't seem like the type that shouldn't be asked. Not like asking another Lost Boy what he was lost from without them volunteering it or asking Peter how he came to be our leader.

Peter sat there staring at me with eyes that were unfamiliar with their expression of anger. I wanted to turn and run, but I was a Lost Boy and Pan was my captain and my friends were behind me and… I was too scared to do anything except stand there anyway. Pan slowly stood up and moved towards me until he was right in front of me. I still couldn't move and wasn't even sure I was breathing so I found myself looking straight ahead at his neck. "What did you say you found, Cubby?" he asked in a voice rimed with ice.

I wanted to say that it was nothing or that I'd only been joking. Anything that would make this whole terrible nightmare go away. I couldn't. Lost Boys lie to each other at times, but none of us ever lied to Peter. He was our protector and our rescuer from the 'real' world and if we lied to him the magic might go away and never come back. "I found a jaguar pelt, Peter." I spoke in a whisper so low that even I didn't hear the words.

Peter moved so fast that I didn't even see him un-sheath his dagger, the point of which was now poking against the soft part under my chin, pressing lightly against it. "Don't ever mention that thing to me again, Cubby the Brave. Do you understand?" I nodded as much as I could without putting a hole under my chin from the dagger still pressed there. "If you ever mention that within my hearing again I'll…" He stopped, his eyes not as furious as they were puzzled. As if he wasn't sure what he was doing now or what he'd do if he heard of the pelt again. "I'll… I'll… I'll banish you forever or tie you to the crocodile or something even badder." There was a gasp from one of the boys behind us that Peter ignored. The pressure from the dagger had steadily increased as Peter had tried to figure out what the consequences would be and I finally fell over backwards to escape it. I looked up at him from where I was sprawled on the ground and for some reason felt a lot of sympathy for him. I suddenly knew there was something wrong about this pelt that I didn't know about and that he couldn't tell me even if he wanted to. My heart was beating so loudly that I heard it pump a dozen times while everyone and everything in the common room froze. Pan's dagger made its way back to its sheath and then he grabbed one of my arms and helped me up with some effort. He stared at me once again, his eyes having returned to the look of mischief that Lost Boys and their captain normally carry. "Don't ever mention that in my hearing nor let me see it ever." He spoke in a normal voice, but emphasized the 'in my hearing' part. "Do you understand what I'm saying, Cubby the Brave?" Any other time being called 'the Brave' would have been mocking me but I didn't get that sense at all. I nodded and he clapped me on the shoulder as though we'd spent the last few minutes discussing how I'd managed to get stuck on the ceiling upside down once again. Peter moved away from me and went over to talk to Leo and Tig about some sort of ambush that could be done from a tree somewhere. Red came up shaking his head.

"That pelt's going to get you into a lot of trouble. You oughta give up on it and bury it in the woods somewhere or throw it off the cliffs."

"I can't," I answered. "It's something that needs an answer. 'sides I couldn't throw another Lost Boy's pelt away. You couldn't either." Red nodded in less than enthusiastic agreement. "Maybe I should go talk to Nibbler now. He might be able to tell me something about where it came from or who it belongs to." I tried to reach the middle of my back so I could scratch at whatever it was that had started biting me there.

Red looked around the room to see that Peter, Tig, and Leo had wandered somewhere else. In fact he and I were the only ones in the common room at the moment. Red grinned. "Perfect. I'll come with you, but first I gotta do something." I watched as he took the slingshot that he'd 'modified' the elastic on and dropped it on Tigger's hammock. He gave me a grin and then climbed through his trapdoor to the outside world. It took a couple of attempts for me to get through mine and then I got stuck once before I finally fell out of the other door outside Hangman's Tree. "What took you so long?" Red demanded when I got to my feet.

"Never mind," I said. I was going to have to lay off the blueberries, and the apples, and the stew, and a bunch of other stuff. He laughed at my answer and then led the way to Lost Boys' Field. As if knowing where our destination was, the day was cloudy and gloomy with a bit of drizzle occasionally falling. Neither of us minded the rain and by the time we got to the big oak tree that guarded the 'sort of cemetery' we were both covered in mud from our knees down from having stomped through mud puddles.

"What if he's not here?" I asked Red as we stopped underneath the oak tree where it was surprisingly dry.

"Then I guess you'll just have to wait for him, Furball," a voice from above called down. We both looked up to see Nibbler swinging upside down from a tree limb by only his feet, the rabbit ears of his pelt swaying back and forth as he swung. I could do the same thing using my knees but I was pretty sure there was no way my feet were strong enough. I glared half-heartedly at Red cuz I knew he'd be the one to have passed on his nickname for me to Nibbler.

"Can you teach me to do that?" I asked as I looked up again to see Nibbler still swinging from his feet.

He moved his feet and plummeted through the branches, managing to miss every one of them. He twisted in midair and landed lightly in front of us on his feet. I tried not to be too jealous since I hardly ever landed on my feet when I fell out of trees. "I can't teach you now, but I promise I will if you ever show up on the other side."

"Um… okay." I really wasn't sure what to say to a promise of something that will occur after you go on to the next adventure.

Nibbler laughed as though he knew exactly what I was thinking. "So what's up mates o' mine?"

Red poked me in my side with his elbow when I didn't say anything right away. I was a little scared to mention it after Pan's reaction to it. Red poked me again. "Quit it, that hurts. It's about this pelt I found," I said to Nibbler. "It's a jaguar pelt and it's gotta belong to a Lost Boy but no one knows whose it is or anything."

Nibbler reached down and snagged a dandelion and started chewing on the end of it while he pondered. "A jaguar pelt?" he mused aloud. "I don't think there's ever been one of those around that I know of. Where'd you find it?"

I looked at Red who shrugged back. It couldn't be nearly as bad as having told Peter. "I found it on _The Jolly Roger_ when we were doing a raid. It was down this door… uh, hatch thing in a room with just a chair in it."

"Bow or stern?"

"Back… Stern."

Nibbler continued chewing on the dandelion stalk as he stared up into the tree as though some sort of answer might be attached to one of its branches. He slowly shook his head. "I've never seen nor heard of a jaguar pelt and I've never shepherded anyone through the ways who didn't have their pelt with them. Sorry Cubbs."

I let out the breath that I'd been holding. "Rats. I was hoping you'd know cuz I mean it doesn't belong to any current Lost Boy, so it must belong to someone who's gone on to the next adventure. Now I don't know how to find out who it belongs to."

"What makes you think whoever it belongs to has gone on to the next adventure?" Nibbler asked.

"If he don't live in Hangman's Tree and I've never seen him or any of the others haven't then it's gotta belong to someone from a long time ago. And if they ain't one of us no more than that must mean their dead. Uh, gone on to the next adventure. Right?"

"Not always," Red said. "You know if a Lost Boy grows up, Peter banishes them. You can't have grown ups around cuz they'd want to make you go to bed on time or eat your vegetables…"

"Or drink your milk," I chimed in.

"Yeahhh, but that's kinda different in Roo's case. He's…" Red struggled to explain it and finally gave up. "If it weren't for Roo half of us'd be in the middle of that field right now. Anyway, if a Lost Boy grows up, he's gotta be banished. Some go to the real world and some go… other places."

I groaned now that I had something else to worry about. "What happens if I grow up? How do I stop it if it starts? Aw, this is just great."

Red gave me a gentle shove. "Relax, Furball. Of all of us, you'd be the one I'd least expect to grow up. Grow out maybe, but not grow up. It's not like it happens real often and I figure you'd be the one to help others not grow up. _That_ does happen sometimes."

I wasn't sure about that but wasn't going to argue about it. Nibbler let out a huge yawn and I wondered if ghosts could get tired or need dandelion stems to chew on or stuff like that. All of a sudden I had a million questions I wanted to ask Nibbler and knew that I'd never be able to ask any of them because his being a ghost was something that had happened before. I didn't even know how he'd become a ghost. "You guys want to play marbles?" Nibbler asked, dropping to his knees. We both agreed and joined him on the ground. Nibbler smoothed out a large patch of dirt which I'd have sworn was moss covered a second ago. He drew a big circle in the dirt and we all dug in our pockets for marbles.

"Can I use these? I don't have a lot of marbles." I held up a half dozen foil covered tiny chocolate eggs.

Red was surely going to suffocate, he started laughing so hard. "Who'd have thunk it? Cubbs doesn't have a whole lot of marbles. You loose a few marbles, did ya?" The words squirmed out between bouts of laughter.

Nibbler was doing his best not to smile too hard and even I had to grin in spite of myself. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. Very funny. Can I use these or not?"

"I don't care," Nibbler said. "But if I win 'em, I'm going to eat 'em. So if they're magic or something you better not use them. Oh, and no weird rules either. Just regular marbles." I figured Nibbler must have played a few games that Tigger had organized. We both agreed and started to play. Within the first few minutes, I managed to lose five of the six chocolate eggs but had won a marble that was bright red and glowed with some sort of yellow light inside. My stomach rumbled letting me know it didn't think much of the trade-off.

Red was getting ready to shoot when Nibbler spoke up. "So what's the big deal about this pelt, anyway?"

I waited to answer until Red shot and missed my last chocolate egg but did manage to knock one of Nibbler's marbles that had a picture of an orange seagull on it out of the ring. "I don't know," I admitted. "It's in my chest right now, but it's always there in my mind too," I said tapping my head as though I wasn't sure they'd know where my mind was. "Its like it needs me to find out the story behind it or something. I know. It sounds like I've lost my mind… or my marbles."

The sound of laughter or teasing I'd expected never happened. Instead Red looked at Nibbler and they both nodded. "One of those things," Nibbler said. "Sometimes we get into stuff that just won't let you forget about it. It'd figure that a pelt would be one of those things if its owner got into some sort of trouble or something." Nibbler didn't say anything until it was Red's turn to shoot again. He carefully lined up one of Nibbler's marbles that looked a lot like a ruby in his sights and got ready to shoot. "You know, if you found the pelt on _The Jolly Roger_ mayhap you should ask a pirate about it. Red might be able to help you with that." Red's shot ended up flying way over the field of marbles and hit the trunk of the oak tree ricocheting off into the grass.

"You don't know what you're talking about." Red sounded as though Nibbler knew exactly what he was talking about and was less than thrilled that he did.

"Just tell him," Nibbler said calmly. "He won't tell anyone and it's not like he probably wouldn't find out sometime anyway. You can't keep something like that from your best friend. And someone needs to know." I looked from Red to Nibbler and back again wondering what was going on. Whatever it was, I could tell Red was pretty upset by it. Nibbler sighed and started picking up the marbles and eggs he'd won. "You guys figure it out, I have to go meet someone." Both Red and I looked at Nibbler with expressions just this side of scared on them causing Nibbler to sigh again, this time in a depressed way. "No, it ain't none of you. I… Aw, heck. What's the use? I'll see you guys later if you're not scared of me too much." I watched as he climbed up the tree and disappeared among the leaves. I knew by now that if I climbed up, I'd find he wasn't there anymore.

"What's wrong with Nibbler? I didn't do anything to get him upset did I?"

"Naw. It's just Nibbler wants to fit in so badly sometimes and he's sort of stuck between this adventure and the next adventure and it gets to him sometimes. He's too young to be doing some of the stuff he does but it's what he wants to do. It's hard to explain."

It might have been hard to explain, but I knew exactly what he meant. I'd have to make a wish on the wishing star that Nibbler'd be happier or something like that. "So what's this thing he was talking about? You and asking pirates and stuff?"

Red had worn a lot of expressions in the time I'd been on the island, but this was the first time he'd had a stricken expression on his face. He looked all around and up in the branches of the tree as though expecting to find someone listening in. "Look, you gotta promise me if I tell you 'bout this you won't tell anyone. I mean anyone at all ever. No way, no how."

"I promise."

"Naw, it has to be a solemn swear that you'll cut your own tongue out or walk the plank before you'd tell. That you could be tortured or beat up or threatened and you still wouldn't tell anyone in the whole world or universe or infinity what I'm going to tell you. No matter what."

"C'mon, Red. It's me. I won't tell, never." The thought of being tortured or walking the plank was something that didn't bear thinking about right now. Instead I was busy thinking about whatever the heck it was that had started biting me on the back again.

"Okay. Repeat after me. I double-dog swear on the grave of every Lost Boy before me and every Lost Boy after me that I will never tell the secret I'm about to hear or I hope my eyes fall out and my tongue swells up and kills me and I get thrown off the island forever and ever." I repeated it and then we each spat in our left hand and shook on it.

"Hey, Red. What happens if Peter asks me about it."

"That's different. He won't and if he does then he'll already know and it won't matter, but you're right. We should have thought of that." We went through the whole swear ceremony except we added that it'd be okay to tell Peter but only if he asked first. When we were done, Red told me to follow him. I'm not sure where he took me and I'm pretty sure I couldn't find it again if my life depended on it. We went up and down hills and across trails, through a couple of caves, up a tree or two and finally jumped from the top of a big hill and landed in a clearing in the middle of a briar patch. Well Red landed in the middle of the clearing. I didn't quite have the same amount of distance and managed to land a couple of feet short of the clearing. Red was nice enough to pull me into the clearing and to spend several minutes helping me pull thorns out of both my pelt and my hide. Even the thing biting my back settled down for a few seconds. After most of the thorns had been pulled out, we both sat down in the clearing, branches of thorns all that was visible around us. Red did the looking around thing again and then started to speak.

"What? I can't hear you. You need to talk louder."

After a couple of times of that happening, he finally spoke loudly enough so I could hear him. "There's this pirate I know…"

"What? You know a pirate?" I couldn't help it. It surprised me. A lot.

Red tried to look everywhere at once as he tried to shush me. "Are you crazy? If anyone else finds out about that they'll kill me or banish me or make me grow up or something."

"But how? Why? When did this happen?"

"If you'll quit blabbering, I'll tell you," he said grumpily. "Just be quiet and listen." He settled down again, swallowed and started talking. "Have you ever wondered how Hook get's his pirates?"

"I dunno. I guess there's some island or someplace he goes to?" It hadn't really been high on my list of wonderings. Not when I could wonder how I could persuade one of the unicorns to take me for a ride or figure out how to fall asleep in the crook of the moon. Both of which I'd been told Lost Boys had done before.

"Yeah, I guess sometimes he does that," Red admitted. "But that's not how he gets all of them. Some of them are Lost Boys who grew up and Pan sent away..."

"What? Go on. That ain't true. No Lost Boy would ever fight with pirates. It just wouldn't be right."

"If Pan sends them away they ain't us anymore, are they." It wasn't a question.

"No, but still. I mean even if I grew up…" I looked around for a piece of wood to knock on. Red realizing what I was doing suggested I try my skull. "Ha, ha. Anyway, I could never fight you guys and I sure wouldn't ever become a pirate. That's just wrong."

"You can barely fight as it is," Red said with a grin. He seemed a little more relaxed but was still serious. "You don't have to worry about growing up anyway. Them that does aren't like you and me or any of the rest of us or they wouldn't have grown up ever. Leastways I don't think they would. And when you grow up things that used to be important aren't quite the same as they were." He cleared his head by shaking it. "It don't matter, that's not what I'm talking about right now anyway. You gotta stop interrupting." We both knew that was more or less impossible but had to be mentioned anyway. "There are others who should have been Lost Boys but something went wrong somehow. Pan didn't rescue them or they drifted ashore wrong or something like that."

"How does that happen? Doesn't every Lost Boy end up here as a… you know, Lost Boy?"

Red looked around again. "How should I know? We don't even know why we were rescued much less why someone else wasn't. Peter once told me there were a few Lost Boys that got misplaced and they're in the 'real' world wandering around as grown ups but are really anything but." He rolled his eyes. "Not another word, Cubster or I'll make sure everyone calls you that for a month." I quickly closed my mouth and nodded that I'd be quiet. I still wasn't sure exactly what Red was being so secretive about. All of what he'd told me so far didn't sound as though it was a huge secret.

Red took a deep breath and looked down at his feet. "About half a year ago I was down by the South Shore and almost got took by a pirate. I wasn't paying attention like I shoulda been and he popped up behind a sand dune. I started throwing coconuts at him but he ducked all of them. All I had was a knife and started to pull it when he threw the cutlass he had down on the ground. Then he sat down. At first I figured it was a trick or something but there wasn't any other pirates around. I just stood there and he sat there. I knew if he tried to get up, I could get away 'fore he even got close." He stopped as he got a thoughtful expression as though replaying the day in his mind.

"Then what happened?" I finally asked impatiently.

"If you'll give me a moment, I'll tell you. Cubster." I closed my mouth so hard it made a clicking sound. "He told me that he wished he was a Lost Boy. He said that he'd gotten mixed up in Hook's crew because he'd been in some raft or lifeboat or something like that because he'd tried to get to Neverland that way. He'd been so out of his mind with hunger and thirst that he'd agreed to almost anything and wasn't sure what he'd been doing when he signed _The Jolly Roger's_ log to become a pirate. Now he says he figures he's more one of us than a pirate. He became cook so he doesn't have to fight us and even if he did he'd make sure he didn't hurt any of us." He nodded at me, grinning, as I tried to say I wanted to speak without actually saying it. "Yeah, go ahead Cub."

"So how'd he end up on this beach if he was a cook and why'd he have a cutlass?"

"He was on the beach looking for shellfish and he had a cutlass in case anyone attacked him." Red wasn't quite exasperated with me, but I could tell it wouldn't take a whole lot.

"So you don't think he might be tricking you or something?"

"Why would he do something like that? He could have captured me if he wanted to. Anytime. Not all of them are bad ya know. Some of them didn't want to be pirates but didn't have any choice." Red's words got louder and faster and I wondered how many times he'd had this argument with himself.

"How could he have captured you 'anytime'?"

"Sometimes he tells me when the pirates are going to try searching the island for us again and I tell him about some of the adventures we have. Not stuff that he could use to tell Hook about or how to find us or anything. And I know he can't follow me when I leave." After the amount of time and trouble it took to get to this stupid clearing in the middle of the briar patch, that was one thing I could truly agree with. Still there was something that didn't ring true about the whole thing even if everything sounded like it was nicely wrapped up in good reasoning. Maybe it was the fact that everything seemed to be too neatly tied up. Maybe it was that whatever was on my back was now biting me again and had been joined by at least another friend. I tried to reach around to scratch my back.

"So you could ask him about the pelt, I guess?" I finally asked when the biting had subsided.

"Or you could," he said slowly as his face brightened up. "Yeah. That's it. You can come with me next time and ask him. Then you'll know that he's a Lost Boy that ended up being a pirate by mistake. You'll see. He's a good guy, really. And if he doesn't know about the pelt, he could probably find out about it. Right?"

"Uh, yeah. I guess so." I wasn't at all sure I liked this idea, but Red had been a Lost Boy a whole lot longer than I had and probably knew what he was doing. "When do you meet?"

"Whenever he has some information to give me about whatever Hook might be up to. I could let him know we want to meet by tying a bandana around a palm tree on the South Shore. That's how… What the heck are you doing?"

I'd suddenly sprang to my feet and was spinning around as fast as I could trying to reach my back because there were not four things biting me that I desperately had to scratch. I finally threw myself backwards into the briars. If nothing else, maybe I could impale whatever it was on a bunch of thorns. There was blessed relief for a couple of seconds before the normal pain of having a bunch of thorns puncturing your back occurred. I explained what I was doing to Red.

"You know what it is? You've got fleas. Time for a flea-dip, Furball." After a lot of pulling and tugging from Red, I managed to escape the briar patch. We went through the 100-mile back and forth and sideways trek to travel a half-mile to make sure I couldn't find my way back to the place and finally came to the swimming hole. By the time we'd spent all that time walking, the sun had started to shine so when I bellyflopped into the swimming hole, the fountain of water I made re-soaked him. There are a couple of advantages to being the heaviest Lost Boy when it comes to the ability to move water into the sky.

"This isn't a bath, you know," I emphasized to Red. "I'm just going for a swim." I splashed, imagining fleas getting on flea-sized life rafts to escape the deluge. The biting was gone. I swam to the shore, laying with my head and chest on the sand, eyes closed, and the rest of me in the water. "This has gotta be one of the best feelings in the world. You oughta jump in and get rid of your fleas too. It could just be a matter of minutes before they start biting you. It's not like it's a bath or anything." No self-respecting Lost Boy ever admitted to taking a bath. It just wasn't done. Which is why it was known as a flea-dip instead of a bath.

Red was sitting on a rock spinning a marble. "I don't have to. I don't get fleas."

"Whatdayamean you don't have fleas?" I stood up, water streaming from the pelt and hopefully carrying any remaining tiny critters with it. "We all got them. Even Roo." I'd found that out the first time I'd discovered fleas on my pelt. That was one reason it wasn't too unusual to find a Lost Boy swimming while it was snowing, the so-called 'flea-dip'.

"I used to, but I got an amulet from this elf I know. It repels ticks, fleas, and stuff like that. See?" He pulled out a small round clay circle attached to a string around his neck. There were some symbols and runes on it. "I got another one you can have if you want." He reached into a pocket and pulled out another amulet that looked just like the one around his neck.

"You're going to just give it to me?" I asked, suddenly suspicious. He might be my best friend, but there's no way he was going to just give something like that to me.

"Heck no." He thought about it for a moment. "You have to be Stumble's assistant for me for a week, you gotta do latrine duty for me twice and you gotta do… I dunno. Clean fish for me."

"It's not worth that much," I said. Latrine duty was totally gross. Almost as bad as cleaning fish.

"Fine," he said beginning to shove it back in his pocket. "I'm sure Surefoot won't mind not being eaten alive by fleas."

The moment he said that my back began to itch in anticipation of what I knew would happen later. "Fine. I'll do it." He grinned as he tossed me the amulet. He knew I'd agree to it. Heck, even I'd known that I was going to agree. I put the amulet around my neck. "Is that it or is there anything else I have to do?"

"You have to rub it three times in the sunlight and it'll be activated. Then you'll be flea free."

We headed back towards Hangman's Tree and I paused in the middle of a large field to activate the amulet. It grew warm as I rubbed it. That was normal. What wasn't normal was the fact that Red was running as fast as he could for the edge of the woods. "Huh?" I asked intelligently as I tried to figure out what was going on. Before I could get my paws around that fact, I was interrupted by a very loud humming sound coming from the other edge of the field. "Oh Hook's handkerchief," I cursed as I looked to see what was making the humming sound and knew instantly what was going on. Coming towards me was a swarm of cowflies so thick it was like a black cloud.

Cowflies were like horseflies with a few important differences. Cowflies were about twice as big as horseflies which is why they were called cowflies. Plus it sounded a lot better to call them cowflies rather than 'twice-as-big-horseflies.' Another important difference was that the bite of a cowfly hurt twice as much as a horsefly. They were also twice as mean and would chase a Lost Boy twice as far. The most important difference was that a cowfly could fly twice as fast as a horsefly. I could barely out-gallop a horsefly. I was doomed. Naturally the amulet was spelled or something so I couldn't just pull it off. I only had one chance which was to turn around and gallop as fast as I could for the swimming hole. Red's laughter followed me.

It took most of the rest of the day for the amulet to dissolve in the water. Red hung out with me while I was waiting, but not before he let every other boy know that I was trapped in the swimming hole so they could come and visit me and listen to Red tell them about the horrified look on my face as I'd discovered what was going on. Tig was especially impressed by how fast Red had gotten me back for the milk joke that morning as well as the fact that he'd used _cow_flies. I'd moved fast enough, as Red knew I would, to avoid most of the bites and only had a few welts. Twice as big as horsefly welts would have been, naturally. The cowflies hovered above the water and dive-bombed me regularly until the clay dissolved. They didn't pay any attention at all to the others.

"How'd you manage to pull that on me?" I asked Red when the clay had dissolved and the cowflies had gone looking for real cows to bother. "The milk stunt was only this morning." After refusing to believe he was psychic—"Psycho is more like it"—he told me that the whole thing was a coincidence. He'd planned on using it on Surefoot who he also owed a trick to. Everything had fallen in place for him to play it on me so he'd gone for it.

"You know what this means, don't you?" I demanded as I squished my way back towards Hangman's Tree with him following.

"That you owe me one now?" He didn't seem particularly worried about the possibility.

"Heck no. I mean I do, but that's nothing compared to what I mean."

"C'mon Cubbs. It was only a joke. You didn't get killed or anything."

"Doesn't matter. I don't care what you say. I'm not doing latrine duty or cleaning fish or helping Stumble cook stew. So there." I couldn't see it, but I knew he was rolling his eyes. I might have been able to come up with something worse, but I still wanted his help to find out about that pelt.


	14. Chapter 14: Fishing and Pirates

Tig, Leo, Stumble and I were sitting at the common room table, each of us with a pile of strawberries in front of us. It wasn't often there were strawberries for breakfast and it was even more uncommon that they didn't end up in stew somehow. You haven't really lived until you've tasted fish stew with chunks of strawberries floating in it. There was a thump as Surefoot stumbled out of his trapdoor and landed on the dirt floor. "Hey Tig, that elf you wanted is outside. She says if you're buying you'd better do it now."

Tigger looked at his strawberries and then at Surefoot and back at his strawberries. Surefoot gave an elaborate shrug and disappeared back through his trapdoor to the outside world. "Don't worry, I'll guard your strawberries," Leo said to the anxious expression on his twin's face. Tig shot him a look of gratitude and started off towards his trapdoor. He'd only gotten a few steps when he turned and ran back to the table and carefully licked each strawberry.

"What'd ya do that for?" Leo demanded.

"Oh… you know," said Tig in a vague way before heading back towards and through his trapdoor.

Leo watched as Tigger disappeared through the door and then stared at the pile of now slightly damp strawberries. He was down to the last two of his own. Stumble and I exchanged grins as we watched Leo. "Like that's going to stop me," Leo muttered just loud enough for us to hear and started scarfing his brother's strawberries down. I couldn't feel too sorry for Tigger, he should have known better. Last week half of us were playing 'Dragon Hunt' and we'd come across a real dragon. Fortunately it was a young one. Unfortunately it was a young one with a cold. Leo had been leading and ended up covered in dragon snot. If that hadn't been a problem, I doubted that a little brotherly spit was going to be.

I'd finished my strawberries first, so I was sitting there pondering about what I should do with the rest of the day. There was something I wanted to avoid doing, but couldn't remember exactly what it was. I was still waiting on Red to talk to his pirate friend before doing anything else about finding out who owned the dragon pelt. It'd been awhile since I'd gone blueberry hunting and there was a great place next to a cool swimming hole that I could look. I started to get up when Roo walked into the common room. I looked at him and ducked under the table suddenly realizing what it was I'd been trying to avoid.

"Nice try, Furball, but I already saw you. C'mon it won't be that bad. You might even like it."

"What's wrong with you?" Leo asked, looking under the table.

"Nothing," I grumbled. Leo had figured that Roo was getting ready to dose me with some sort of medicine or maybe sew up a wound. "He's decided to show me how to fish."

Leo looked confused. "What's wrong with that?" he asked as I crawled back out from under the table.

"Nothing if you like to fish." I'd been coerced into it once upon a time when I was still in the real world. It was some sort of school thing and we all went to this brook to 'wet a line' as the headmaster was so fond of repeating over and over again. After two minutes I was bored silly. By the end of that afternoon I had been pretty sure there was an area of purgatory that involved poles, lines and hooks. Leo rolled his eyes, but didn't say anything. He was pretty much used to the fact that I made my way to the beat of a different piper—even for a Lost Boy.

A few minutes later I was carrying and dropping a couple of fishing poles. There was a bunch of string tangled up in one of my pockets and I was pretty sure that I'd managed to get a hook snagged in the back of my right thigh. There had been no sign of Tigger or Surefoot when we'd gotten outside so I couldn't beg either one of them for help. Roo was carrying a bucket of something that sloshed as he walked as well as an empty bucket and was telling me about ranges and tides and things like that. I nodded whenever he paused and tried to look as interested as possible. "Worms."

Roo stopped his monologue. "Huh?"

"Worms. Don't we need to dig up some worms or something to put on the end of the hooks for bait?"

"No, we don't need worms. That's what this stuff is for." He shook the filled bucket causing whatever was in it to slosh again.

I looked down in it, dropping one of the poles I was carrying in the process, to try to see what it was. "Phew. That stuff stinks. What is it?"

"Got me. I asked Stumble if he had anything I could use for bait and he gave me this."

"It's not stew is it?" I asked suddenly feeling very green.

"Who knows. As long as the fish like it, that's all I care about."

We continued on to the beach and I spent what seemed like a lifetime following Roo up and down looking for the exact perfect spot. He did pick one that had a couple of palms for shade, so I figured at least I wasn't going to die from heat exhaustion. He put the dodgy bucket down and asked me for the string/twine. I pulled it out from my pocket and gave it to him.

"What the heck happened?" he asked as he stared at the string that had somehow morphed into a single very large knot in my pocket. I shrugged. "And what's that?" he asked as he pulled something off of it that kept stretching and stretching and stretching.

"Ooooohh! I wondered where that had gone. That's my pine sap gum. Here." I grabbed the side not attached to the string and started pulling. After a few feet most of it came flying off the string and I popped it in my mouth and started chewing. This time it was Roo who looked a little green, but all he did was shake his head and start muttering about something I couldn't make out. I really didn't think it took that long to get the string untangled and we only had to use the knife twice. We finally had two pieces of string of decent size and attached one to each of the poles.

"It'd be tons better if we actually had reels, but this'll work if you're careful. You just gotta cast out as far as you can and make sure the line doesn't get tangled up when you do. Then," he said, taking out a couple of wood rollers, "you just use this to reel the fish in by turning it." I must have looked really skeptical. "Aw, it'll work. The fish that come here aren't real big so you shouldn't have any problem using it. Now watch how I do it."

I stood and watched as Roo took a piece of… something out of the bucket and quickly attached it to the hook he'd tied to the string. He carefully laid the string back in a straight line behind him then picked up the pole, which was facing towards the land, made a whipping motion with it, and I watched as the weight of whatever caused the hook to sail out beyond the breakers. "But that's impossible," I said. "The line is too long and you shouldn't be able to get enough momentum to even begin to do that."

"You saw it happen," he said with a shrug. "Now you try."

I gave a long suffering sigh and tied the hook to the string. It promptly came untied and fell into the sand. After crawling around to find it, I tried again with the same result. I finally tied it with a couple of square knots, a granny knot, and a couple of knots that I don't think had existed before then. It didn't look real good, but I figured it probably added some weight to it. With the hook firmly attached, it was time to add bait.

One All Hallows Eve I'd had the opportunity to put my hand in a bowl of 'eyeballs'. It was really only runny gelatin and tiny marshmallows. That was exactly what this bucket of bait felt like. Except this was warm. The 'eyeballs' hadn't made a sucking sound when I'd pulled one out either nor did it leave a grey stain on my hands like this stuff did. The piece of bait was light and dark grey in colour and felt really slimy. I stuck it on the end of the hook, piercing both the bait and my finger with it. There was blood. I ripped the hook out of my finger, turning the puncture into a cut and without thinking stuck my finger in my mouth. After all, everyone knows that's how you clean a cut. Big mistake. I gagged on the taste that was so foul I couldn't even come up with anything it might have possibly tasted like. Roo looked way too amused as I spat on the ground until I didn't have anymore spit to spit with. The taste was still horrible and seemed to be getting worse. The only solution was water. There was only one quick source for water.

It took all of Roo's strength to pull me back from the sea. I gagged on the seawater too, but it wasn't nearly as bad as the taste of the bait was. "Are you crazy? You can't drink seawater. You'll get sick."

"Promise? Even used seawater has got to taste better than whatever is in that bucket. Besides it's not like I was swallowing. I was just rinsing."

Roo shook his head and returned to his fishing pole which fortunately hadn't washed away or anything. I went back to my pole and started pulling on the string so I could try baiting the hook again. I was pretty proud of myself that I didn't throw everything into the sea when the hook fell off the line as it rose from the sand. I double and triple tied, used granny knots, square knots, bow knots, half-hitches, whole-hitches, double-hitches and when I was done took the gum out of my mouth and folded it around the knots. No way was that hook falling off now. I carefully pulled a piece of bait out of the bucket and managed to put it on the hook without impaling myself or causing another food disaster. I gently placed the line just as I'd seen Roo do it, grabbed the pole and gave it a mighty swing.

"What happened?" I said when I didn't see the baited hook sail into the water. There'd been some resistance, so I knew that it'd moved. The line was still attached to the fishing pole but instead of heading towards the water, it seemed to be headed up and behind me. I looked up in the air just in time for the baited hook to bounce off my nose and hit the ground. I tried several more times and failed just as miserably, although I made sure not to look up so it was my hair that got pummeled by falling bait.

While I was busy trying to get my first cast into the water, Roo had been busy pulling fish in as soon as his line had hit the water. The fish, as he'd said, weren't real big, but he'd gotten enough that the empty bucket he'd filled with sea water was probably a third full. "Hey Cub. I think I forgot to mention something. You need to put just a pinch of pixie dust on the hook before you cast it. That helps it when you snap the pole forward."

"You forgot? You didn't think that might have been important or anything?" I tried to take a close look at Roo's face, but there wasn't any sign of smirk or smile so I figured maybe he really had forgotten. Of course I couldn't get the best view because he was busy pulling in another fish. I put some pixie dust on the hook, made a mighty cast, and watched as the hook sank six inches from the beach.

"You need to go out a little bit further than that," Roo said, completely deadpan. The bad part about it was I'd swear he wasn't trying to be funny or anything. He really was letting me know I hadn't cast it far enough. Three casts later I finally got it beyond the breakers. I'd used more than a pinch of pixie dust which seemed to have helped. I stood there with my pole waiting for a strike and watched as Roo pulled two more fish in.

"This isn't funny." Roo was pulling in another fish and I had yet to get anything. I figured as long as I was going to be stuck here, I might as well make myself comfortable. I took off my pawmocs and sat in the sand, keeping my pole at the approved angle while wiggling my toes in the sand. The sun, heat and sound of the waves took their toll and I slowly slipped off to that place between waking and sleeping. I was pondering a place where kids with antenna were riding very large dragonflies and shepherding huge floating blueberries when the daydream was shattered by Roo yelling my name and telling me to move quick. I figured I'd caught a fish and instead of moving, tried to stand up. That might have worked, except when I stood up, I put my foot right in front of the claw of the crab that Roo had been warning me about. I yelled in both pain and surprise and gave a mighty yank on the fishing pole while trying to jump, move, and kick at the same time.

I looked at Roo who was looking at me upside down. "How the heck did you manage to do this?" he asked in awe. There were a bunch of stars circling in front of my eyes and for some reason I was drooling. The stars weren't so bad, but instead of dripping down my chin, the drool was going up my nose. It wasn't too hard to work out after that, that he wasn't really upside down, I was. Somehow when I pulled back on the fishing pole and tried to get away from the crab who was busy amputating my big toe I'd managed to get the line twisted around myself and the palm tree we'd been near. Now I was hanging upside down from my right foot which had somehow gotten lashed to the palm tree with the string attached to the fishing pole. I was getting hit in the face by a goldfish size fish blowing in the breeze from the other end of the line . "At least you caught a fish," Roo said, hastily backing away from my reach and trying not to laugh. He shook his head. "That line wouldn't even hold me up like that. It should be impossible for you. You must've used too much pixie dust or something." Before I could answer, there was a musical 'ping' and the string that had been holding me up was no longer holding me up. Fortunately it was sand that I landed in so the stars in front of my eyes didn't last as long as they normally did.

"This isn't working," Leo observed. I could have told him that before we'd even started but he wouldn't have believed me. "Let's try something else." He grabbed what I'd thought was another fishing pole, but it wasn't quite as long as the others and had a sharp point on one end. He gestured at me to follow him and I ended up standing in the sea a couple of feet from where the waves were breaking on the sand. The water was a little above my knees. "All ya have to do is stand real still until the fish get used to you." We stood there for a few minutes, Roo with the stick held poised above the water with the pointy end down. The sun was beating down on my head and I wished I'd brought a hat or something. I could've put the hood up on my pelt, but there's something about a fur hood in hot weather that just doesn't work real well.

"See?" Roo whispered at me. I looked down and saw some rather large fish swimming below where we were standing. Faster than I could follow, Roo took the pointed stick and speared a fish. "It's easy. You can try it here and I'll move down a bit to fish." He handed me the stick and waded back in to throw the fish in the bucket at to grab his fishing pole.

I carefully stood as still as I ever could, holding the stick as Roo had shown me. The fish finally reappeared and I waited for them to approach my legs. As one was almost perfectly placed I sneezed and watched as the fish disappeared in an instant. "You can't sneeze, Cub. You'll scare the fish." I thought of about a million responses to that but didn't say anything. I shifted my legs and stood motionless once again.

It took a little longer for the fish to reappear this time. Finally one got in the perfect position. I stuck my tongue in the corner of my mouth, held my breath, and slammed the pole down on top of the fish. At least on top of where I thought the fish was. I didn't come close to the fish, but I did manage to spear something else. Pain blossomed in my right foot. Red swears that he heard the sound of my yell back at Hangman's Tree, although I think he's just joshing. It did clear the beach of seagulls for about a minute. I came out of the water hopping on one foot trailing blood with Roo telling me it was a good thing there weren't any sharks around. I think he was kidding.

I collapsed on the sand and looked at my foot which had an impressive amount of bloody water on it. Roo looked at it. "It's not too bad. It just looks that way. You scraped a bunch of skin off but didn't go too deep." He bandaged it up with a strip of cloth. "Whoa."

"What?" I asked, waiting for him to tell me I'd managed to stick a hole in an artery, although I wasn't sure there were any arteries in the top of a person's foot.

"You broke the point of the spear off. Leo's going to have to make another one now. Wait 'til he hears how this one got broken. I don't think that's ever happened before."

"Can we be finished now?" I asked plaintively.

"I guess so. We got plenty of fish and your pole and the spear are broken. Anyway, maybe you were right. Maybe it's better if you don't go fishing anymore. You can dig clams or oysters or something next time." That made me happy enough that I even carried the bucket of fish back to Hangman's Tree. Surprisingly enough there weren't any mishaps on the way back and both bucket and fish arrived intact.

"You get in a pirate fight or something?" Red asked, staring at me. I'd just given the fish into Stumble's care when Red had popped into the common room.

"Naw. I got to go fishing."

Red looked as though he really wanted to ask a question or two but instead settled on ignoring that and whispering, "Tonight."

"Tonight? Tonight, what?"

"Shhhh. Keep your voice down." He looked around even though the only other person around was Stumble who was busy rendering fish into stew. "You know. Those questions you had about a certain thing for a certain someone? He left a note saying he could meet tonight in the usual place."

"Oh. Yeah. Tonight? Why tonight? Why can't it be during the day?"

Red sighed. "He's the ship's cook. It's the only time he can get away without anyone being suspicious."

"But didn't you say he met you during the day before?"

"Yeah, he did. That doesn't have anything to do with now, though. He could do it then but can't do it now because now he's not gathering anything like he was then so if he does it during the day then it'll look funny but won't if no one sees him going out at night so it's better that way. Get it?"

I didn't but finding out who had owned that pelt was still bugging me big time so I figured it didn't matter if I got it or not. "I guess so. You're sure he can be trusted and everything, right?"

"Why do you keep asking me that?" Red demanded. He was still whispering and the words weren't loud, but they were said with enough force I could practically feel the dirt walls shake with the intensity.

"Because I'm scared," I said honestly.

"Aw Cubbs. You're scared of everything. Even your own shadow. If you don't want to come, you don't have to. I thought you wanted to find out about the pelt."

"Don't worry. I do. I'll come with you. But I got one more question."

"What now?" There was an exasperated tone to the question.

I pointed to where Stumble was still working on the fish. "Aren't you supposed to clean and take the bones out of those before you put them in stew?"

"C'mon," Red said, pulling me away from where I was staring at Stumble's food preparation. "Sometimes it's just better not to know about things at all."

The rest of the day went by smoothly and quickly. I won at "King of the Hill" as I normally do and lost at "Tag" which was also where I usually place. I scarfed as many berries as I could find during the day too since I wanted to avoid the stew that evening. I climbed into my pallet early but no one was suspicious. They just figured I was trying to get away from hearing about my fishing adventure for the zillionth time. Stumble said he was pretty sure the whole thing would become some sort of Lost Boy legend for the future. I was glad I was able to provide so much amusement for my friends.

"C'mon, Cub. Man, you're impossible to wake up." I opened my eyes to see Red's worried face peering down at me. "About time. I've been trying to get you up forever." We both listened but only heard snoring and a few moans and whimpers. Unfortunately the moans and whimpers were as normal as the snores were when it came to sleeping. Lost Boy's dreams weren't always the best. After deciding that no one was actually awake, I grabbed my wooden sword and we each took to our own trapdoors and tumbled outside of Hangman's Tree. The night sky was alive with a zillion stars but there was something missing and the night was darker than just the mist rising from the woods would cause.

"It's a new moon," I said accusingly to Red. "We can't go out there. We have to do this some other time."

Red looked around too, the ears on his fox pelt bent over giving him a uncharacteristic defeated look. "I didn't know there wasn't a moon out. It doesn't matter though. You haven't been a Lost Boy that long and I… I'll just have to deal with it."

Neverland has a very interesting and usually pretty cool lunar system. There's almost always a moon ranging from a crescent to a full moon. Sometimes there are even two of them floating through the night sky. Every now and again, about twice a year, there's no moon at all. Anywhere else it wouldn't be a big deal whether the moon was there or not. Neverland, however, isn't like anywhere else at all. When there is no moon in the night sky the boundary between Neverland and the 'real' world tends to run and fade a little. It's a time when it's easiest to move between the two places without benefit of happy thoughts and pixie dust. Even then it's still bloody hard for physical things to go from one place to the other. It's other things that move between the two places almost without pause. Memories. Feelings. Wishes. Thoughts. One of the best things about being a Lost Boy is that when you get to Neverland you start to forget about the 'real' world and especially those things that happened there that caused you to need to be rescued and become a Lost Boy in the first place. It's not exactly falling out of prams that cause a boy to become a Lost Boy. But on the night of a new moon those memories can come tumbling across the border and those things you thought you'd left behind forever are suddenly there once again just as horrible and terrifying as they were the first time. I'd been told that Midnight Walks were a frequent thing when there was a new moon. Of course it wouldn't be Neverland if there weren't some good that came of it too. Thoughts and wishes on our side of the border found themselves in the 'real' world and were picked up by those who were receptive to it. Why do you think the name Peter Pan is so well known in the 'real' world?

Normally the best way to combat a new moon was to sleep through it. The nightmares would be worse than usual, but nightmares were always better than having the memories of stuff haunt you when you were awake. Since I hadn't been a Lost Boy that long I still pretty much remembered why I'd come to be here. Red had been away from the 'real' world a lot longer and probably just had the vaguest idea of what had happened to him or caused him to become lost. "Let's just forget about it tonight," I said with as much feeling behind it as I could. "We can find out some other night or something."

Red shook his head. "Naw, it's okay. I can handle it." He gave me a grin that looked both false and ghastly in the starlight.

"Maybe you can handle it, but I'm scared and not just of my shadow which I can't even see. C'mon, it ain't worth it."

Red stubbornly shook his head. "I'm going with or without you, so if you want to find out if Cookie knows anything about that pelt, ya might as well come with me." The problem with Red was he figured if he didn't go it'd make him look like a coward. Even if I'd been nutsy enough to think he was cowardly for not going, I'm the last person who'd have mentioned it to him or anyone else. He'd end up thinking that he hadn't been brave enough and that would eat at him for ages. Fortunately, as craven as I am, I didn't have any such problems with being chicken. I just wasn't going to be able to use it to stop him like I normally could.

Red started off through the woods and I watched until he almost disappeared among the trees. With a sigh and a curse for myself, I took off at a gallop until I caught up with him. He flashed me a grin which told me he'd never been in doubt that I'd be right behind him. I decided I'd figure out later whether that irritated me or made me sort of proud.

The trip through the woods was worse than normal. It wasn't the hills this time but the fact that with only the light of the stars to see by I tripped over every root, branch, and hole imaginable. Not to mention I was pretty sure that my tramping could be heard all over the island. There would be no sneaking up on anyone tonight. Red suddenly came to a stop and I almost ran over him. I stood there breathing heavily with sweat dripping off my face while Red looked around. "I'm not used to it being this dark," he said uncertainly. "Maybe we should have turned… naw, that's not right. It's over here I think, but…" He gave a low uncharacteristic moan and suddenly spun around twice, continuing to moan as he turned.

"Red, what's wrong?" I'd never seen him like this before and had no clue what was wrong or what to do. For a moment he cowered from something I couldn't see and then turned to me.

"We gotta get outta here. Right now." Before I could begin to ask what we had to get away from, Red bolted.

"Red! Wait up," I yelled as I started to trot after him. I knew if I lost sight of him they'd probably find my partially eaten body in the middle of nowhere, although I'm sure someone would have come up with a pretty good tale to explain it. I hadn't taken more than a couple of steps when something clamped on my left shoulder and squeezed so hard that I collapsed to the ground. I'd felt pain before, but nothing like this. The hand that had grabbed me released it's grip. In the darkness I could see three or four forms, but couldn't make out anything beyond the fact they were vaguely man-shaped out.

"Where ye think ye be going, maggot?" a voice that sounded as though it was coming through a throat made of rusty iron pieces asked.

"I don't believe this one be liking our company," a second voice of smug satisfaction declared. "No matter, ye'll find our company grows on a body in one form or another." There was grim chuckling at that announcement and I went from being merely terrified to horrified. "You're pirates," I said in one of the more unnecessary sentences I've ever uttered.

"Pirates? Us? G'wan. Ye must be kidding. What be givin' ye that idea, maggot? Could it be these powerful sharp swords we be carryin'?" There was a rasp as a cutlass was pulled from it's sheath and playfully poked at me a couple of times before being returned. "Or pehap it be the fact that we could be making you walk the plank and go swimmin'. A swim ye never be returning from, eh?"

"Belay that bilge," a voice that I hadn't heard yet called out. "The cap'n be wanting to ask this brat some questions and ask them swiftly. Ye can be terrifying 'im later."

Amateur. I'd passed terror awhile ago. While there was a verbal fight going on about the parentage of one of the pirates, I sprung up as fast as I could and took off in the opposite direction. It was a daring escape. One that the elves tell tales about, that dwarves toast, and that bards sing about. Funny, they never mention what happens when one bounces off a tree they don't see in the dark. I did a brilliant job of that and the night suddenly exploded into millions of lights as my head hit the trunk. Before I could hit the ground, I'd been grabbed by three sets of hands.

"He be a runner, that one. Tie 'im up, hands and ankles. If we don't get back soon, all of ye'll be the ones takin' their last swim. Within a couple of minutes my wrists and ankles had been tied tightly together.

"Now what?" one of the pirates asked the one I guessed was the leader.

"Now you swabs pick him up and carry him back to the boat. Be quick about it. No tellin' when his friend'll realize what happened."

"Pick 'im up?" one of them asked in astonishment. "He looks 'eavy."

"Then it'll be you that tells 'im why he ain't with us when we get back to the ship." There was some general cursing at that thought and after a couple of minutes I was hoisted over someone's shoulder which created a great deal of specific cursing. I stuck my tongue out at the pirate following which only resulted in getting a nasty tasting piece of cloth stuck in my mouth. After what seemed like forever but was probably only about half an hour or so the woods became a beach that I didn't recall ever seeing before. Of course it was still almost pitch black and I wasn't exactly in the best position to see anything. The pirate carrying me casually dropped me into a rowboat that had been pulled up on the beach.

"Ye great lumberin' idjit," one of the pirates said to the person who'd dropped me. "Get 'im out o' there. It be bad enough dragging the rowboat without him bein' in it." With a curse, I was pulled back out of the boat and dumped on the beach which I quickly discovered was gravel and not sand. The pirates dragged the boat into the water and while two of them held it, the other two came back and dragged me by my feet to the water's edge. I was picked up again and 'accidentally' dropped into the water by the boat. I was beginning to be convinced I was going to drown before one of them hauled me up by my hair and dumped me in the boat. "That's for bein' so bloody 'eavy."

"Enough," the leader said. "Start rowin' ye dogs." There were a few grumbles and then I heard the splash of oars on the water. I'd landed face up and all I could see where the stars above me. They were suddenly blotted out by the leader's head looking down at me. "T'would hate to be in your shoes, lad," the man said in almost a whisper. He didn't look very happy at matters at the moment. "Ye made the cap'n very upset with ye and that normally be a very fatal condition." He pulled the cloth out of my mouth and tossed it overboard.

"That was me best one, Mr. Smee," one of the pirates objected. There was no answer, just the splash of the oars.


	15. Chapter 15: A Meeting With Hook

Mr. Smee didn't look anything like I'd expected him to. He was kinda average, even for a pirate. Average height, average weight, average pirate clothing. There weren't any scars or pieces missing from his face or hands. No tattoos or piercings save for a gold ring through his right earlobe. He was clean shaven and tufts of gray hair peeked beneath the shapeless hat he was wearing. If he'd walked by me on some high street I probably wouldn't have given him a second thought. There was no way I could even begin to say that about Hook or the other pirates. Smee looked worried as he continued to stare down at me, then seemed to rouse himself and moved out of my field of vision so that all I could see were the stars again.

For awhile the only sound I heard was the labored breathing of the pirates and the splash of the oars as they moved back and forth through the water. I wondered what was going to happen to me and hoped that whatever it was, it wouldn't hurt too long. I didn't think that moving on to the next adventure would bother me as much as the pain I just knew would be involved getting to that state. It didn't take nearly enough time for the bow of the rowboat to nudge the side of _The Jolly Roger_. The pirates began moving about and the oars were dropped on top of me where I lay in the bottom of the boat. From my position, I could see the side of the pirate ship and watched as a rope ladder came unrolled as it made it's way down the side of the ship. In another moment I was jerked to my feet and stood unsteadily in the rocking boat as the circulation thought about returning to my feet.

"Wha' about 'im?" one of the pirates asked, giving me a jerk in case there was some doubt as to whom he was talking about. "I don' fancy carryin' him up t' the deck."

"Then perhaps ye should untie 'im, Mr. Laskin," Smee said. That suggestion caused the other pirates to start talking with a lot of gestures about the possibility that I might escape if I was untied. The thought of me being able to scrape up enough courage to jump into the ocean and swim the distance to shore was laughable, even if it was very easy to keep myself from laughing.

"Ye remember what happened the last time we untied one o' these brats, doncha Mr. Smee?" one of the pirates asked.

There was a sigh. "Ye may be remembering that be on dry land as well, Mr. Finch. As well be the fact that the one ye cut loose was dressed as a fox. Foxes be wily and quick. This lad be dressed as a bear. Don' that be tellin' ye something?" Smee tried to explain patiently. When he mentioned a person dressed as a fox, I figured it had to be Red. He'd never mentioned being captured by pirates or anything like that but it could have been before I even showed up on the island. I wondered if it'd had anything to do with Red becoming friends with one of Hook's crew. It sure didn't sound like the way Red had told me he'd met Cookie, but it wasn't something that was real important at the moment.

Before any of the pirates could comment on exactly what my wearing a bear pelt meant, there was a call from _The Jolly Roger_. "Mr. Smee, it has been exactly three minutes since you rammed my ship with that rowboat. Is there perhaps some reason the prisoner has not yet been brought aboard? Perhaps the bilge rats with you need some instruction in the finer art of prisoner handling."

The rowboat threatened to capsize as the pirates reacted to Hook's displeasure. The three crew members looked terrified as Smee simply shook his head. "No, Cap'n. They be just telling the brat 'bout what could befall 'im now that he be a visitor of the scourge of the Seven Seas." There was no fear in his voice, just a matter-of-fact telling.

"I'm sure," came the response. "I would suggest that the time for tales be ended and the prisoner be brought up forthwith or he will not be the only one walking the plank this day." There was a lot of grumbling and fretful looking up at the deck above before one of the pirates pulled a rusty dagger from somewhere and with a couple of quick swipes cut the bonds on my ankles and wrists. Not only was I free, but I also had a new cut on the leg of the bear pelt from which I could feel blood oozing from. It wasn't turning out to be a good day. I tried to fall over the side of the rowboat (it doesn't take nearly as much courage to fall as it does to try and escape) but one of the pirates yanked me back while cussing at me.

"Lad, you can't be escapin', so ye might as well hoist yeself up there and face it like a man… er a boy." Smee's advice was echoed non-verbally by one of the pirates who stuck his cutlass in the back of my neck, just slightly puncturing the skin. There was another brief argument about who would be the last one up, since everyone seemed to be in agreement that I wouldn't make it to the top of the ladder without falling at least once. I could have told them it would probably be more than once, but no one bothered to ask me about it. Only another inquiry from the deck above stopped the discussion from becoming a full-blown brawl. I was puzzled by the apologetic look that Smee seemed to give me but figured I had imagined it.

In the end it was decided that all the pirates but one would go up before me so that there'd be one to offer 'encouragement' should I resist or try to escape. By the time my turn came to climb the ladder, I was so scared that I managed to slip as I started out. I fell back in the rowboat causing it to capsize and sending the remaining pirate and myself into the water. The pirate had managed to hold onto his cutlass and used it quite freely in directing me to the ship's rope ladder. After a couple of tries, I managed to climb out of the water, the pirate following.

I actually made it all the way up the ladder on the first try through the encouragement of the cutlass from below and the increasingly irritated complaints from above. Once I got to the top, I swung a leg over the rail and collapsed on the deck breathing heavily and my eyes screwed tightly shut. There was a moment of foot tapping and then Hook's unmistakable voice. "I will have him in my cabin in four minutes and you had best make sure that he doesn't drip on the carpet." There was the sound of retreating footsteps.

"Mr. Clifton, if ye'd be so kind."

I felt something grab me by the back of the bear pelt's neck and lift me up. In another moment I was being shaken like a rat and opened my eyes to catch the blurry sight of the giant pirate who'd picked me up and was shaking me in a slightly bored manner. When the water stopped flying from both the pelt and my hair, he dropped me to my feet on the deck. Mr. Smee gave me a cursory examination and then nodded at the giant who picked me up by the scruff of the neck again and followed Mr. Smee across the deck.

"Hey," I said, surprising myself. "I can walk you know." The only response was a tightening at the scruff of my neck and I decided it probably wasn't necessary to say anything else for awhile. We continued across the deck, down a flight of stairs to a lower level and then inside. Smee stopped in front of a door and knocked. There was a reply from inside and Mr. Smee opened the door while nodding once again at Clifton. I was dropped to my feet and Mr. Smee motioned me into the cabin beyond the doorway. I turned around, thoughts of running to the side of the ship and throwing myself into the water, to see Mr. Clifton standing there grinning unpleasantly at me. There was a sigh from Mr. Smee as I turned to face the cabin doorway once again and walked through.

I'd never been on a ship before and wasn't sure what to expect. Whatever I'd thought a pirate captain's cabin might look like, this wasn't it. Hook was seated behind a plain looking desk covered with maps and other papers. There was a neatly made bed against one wall, a couple of chests and some miscellaneous odds and ends scattered about. The carpet on the floor was just a big piece of fabric. On the desk was a teapot, a couple of china cups, and a plate of tiny cakes of some sort. Smee escorted me to the edge of the desk as Mr. Clifton remained by the door. "May I present Master Cubby, Cap'n." he said before stepping back. A tiny part of my mind wondered how he knew my name but decided it probably wasn't worth worrying about at the moment. From where I was now standing, I could smell the scent of chocolate coming from the pot on the desk.

"A bear. What a droll sense of humor dear Peter has," Hook said as he looked up at me. The words were gently spoken, almost kindly. The eyes belied the tone completely. "Tell me, Master Cubby, do you happen to know how many br… boys have worn the pelt of a bear?" I shook my head. "Ah, I thought not. Mr. Smee, would you enlighten our guest as to the number of faux-bears that Neverland has had wandering about it?"

"I believe that'd be about eight, Cap'n."

"Indeed that would be correct, Mr. Smee." He turned his gaze onto me again and I had to make a very conscious effort not to disgrace myself. "Tell me boy, do you have any idea why you would be the ninth soul to be graced with the skin of a bear?" I just stood there trying not to whimper. Hook gave a half-smile as if sharing a closely held confidence. "It's because they do not last very long, I'm afraid. All of them have come to a very terrible end. An end that happened to them very quickly but not very fast if you fathom my meaning. In fact, I do believe that out of all the boys Pan put into a bear pelt, the longest any of them survived was only three months. Would you not agree, Mr. Smee?"

"That's right Cap'n."

Hook nodded. "Thus if you have anything between those ears of yours except stuffing, boy, you can figure out yourself why you're wearing that pelt. It's a pity, really. I feel certain that you were given promises of carefree days participating in boyish pursuits with the occasional hi-jinks thrown in and maybe a 'friendly' battle or two. Pan tends to… embellish things when he recruits his team." Hook leaned forward and put a concerned expression on his face which, again, didn't reach his eyes. "There's magic in this place, boy. Real magic. Magic that could let you live like royalty. I could show you how to use that magic. Would you not rather live a long life as a prince, than a very brief one as a disposable pauper?"

I didn't say anything, but just stood there which neither seemed to anger or surprise Hook. "Everyone must make their own decisions about their future, boy. I trust, for your sake naturally, that you will make the right decision when it comes to yours." He sharpened his gaze on me. "You know, it would only take one person. A courageous and brave person. Just one person to end this wearying feud between pirates and Lost Boys. Do you think my men want to kill those who have made a home here? Of course not. They would much rather be on the high seas. This fight is between me and Pan. You could be the one who went down in history as the one who stopped the battles by telling me where I can find Pan. I promise a fair fight. Mr. Smee will tell you I'm a man of my word, won't you Smee?

"Yes indeed you are Cap'n. No member of the crew would ever dispute that." For some reason that didn't sound like a very reassuring recommendation to me.

Hook reached across the desk and poured a cup of liquid from the teapot into one of the cups. It wasn't tea but hot cocoa that splashed into the cup and my stomach rumbled at the smell. "Ah, I see you're familiar with this delectable beverage. Might I pour you a cup?"

My mouth started watering in spite of me. Somewhere in the back of my mind, part of me was arguing that there was no way that taking a drink of cocoa would bring harm to myself, Peter or any of the Lost Boys. In fact, it would actually mean that Hook had less cocoa, and wasn't that a good thing? I stared at the cup and the little cakes on the plate for a long time before slowly shaking my head no.

Hook shook his head in mock sorrow. "This is what I mean. How can an agreement between our two factions be reached if I cannot even get one of Peter's crew to take a cup of chocolate or a biscuit? Are you afraid they might be poisoned boy? That would be poor form indeed and not worthy." To demonstrate he made a great production of putting the cup to his lips and quickly drinking its contents. "You're sure you will not join me?" he said as he replaced the cup on his desk. "You look as though you are one who would surely enjoy a large serving." He gave a significant look at my midsection causing me to blush. He then looked up at the lack of response from Mr. Smee and Mr. Clifton causing forced laughter from both of them. I just stood there not saying a word and looking down at the deck in front of me trying to figure out how to become invisible.

"What did you do with the clothing you stole from my ship?"

"What clothing?" I stuttered out, continuing to look at the deck. I figured maybe if I looked at that instead of Hook then maybe I could pretend he was someone else. Anyone else. I couldn't help but think if I accidentally looked into his eyes, I'd be struck frozen like a bird in front of a snake or something. "You mean the pelt?" I could have bitten my tongue as the words left my mouth. There probably wasn't anything bad about saying them, but if Hook could cause me to say stuff like that, then what other stuff could he trick me into saying?

"Pelt?" Hook roared, causing me to jump. "It is no pelt you stole, just a castoff piece of clothing from the ship's slop chest, yet you have an unnatural curiosity about it, boy." I looked up in surprise. "Oh, yes. I know you've been asking about it."

"How'd you know about that?" I asked, quickly looking down again to avoid those eyes.

"I know many things, boy. I know it was you who took it. I know it was you who threw the rock at me when I was parleying with Pan." He slammed the hook down on the surface of his desk causing me to jump again. An involuntary look revealed a gouge in the desktop.

"Marble," I said quietly, almost to myself. "It was a marble and you weren't talking to him. You were trying to trick him."

The voice that answered was one of suppressed rage. "Regardless of the type of object you foully threw before battle had been called and regardless of what you _thought_ in your foolish, simple mind were my intentions it was both poor form and constituted cheating. Such actions can neither be excused or tolerated and as such must have consequences to deter others from these actions." I risked a quick glance at Mr. Smee to see him looking straight ahead with no expression at all on his face. There was a sound similar to nails scraping across a blackboard as Hook pulled his hook out of the desktop. "Smee."

"Yes, Cap'n?"

"The usual. If Master Cubby will not deign to accept our hospitality, answer simple questions, and take a fiendish delight in throwing stones then it is obvious the only use he is fit for is to serve as an example to other brats who persist in messing with their betters."

"Uh, Cap'n?"

"What is it Mr. Smee?" Hook didn't sound at all happy about the interruption and I certainly wasn't going to call any more attention to myself by looking up.

"Are ye not goin' to give the lubber a opputuny to join the crew? Sir?"

"Did you not hear my orders, Mr. Smee? Was I perhaps not clear enough, or perhaps you would like to join him?"

"Aye, Cap'n. No, sir. Mr. Clifton?"

I felt the deck shake as the pirate left his position by the door to come to where I was shaking in my pawmocs. I figured I was going to be instantly struck down by the huge pirate but was instead lifted up in the air by the scruff of the pelt's neck once again and carried back onto _The Jolly Roger's_ deck with Mr. Smee following. I was dropped next to the main mast and surrounded by a group of jeering pirates. "Well, Mr. Smee?" one of them called.

"O'er the side, boys."

"Anchor, rope and chains?" the same pirate asked. I didn't think it was possible for my shivering to get any worse but it did until the thought hit me that this wasn't for real. Obviously it was all a big fake act to get me to talk or drink cocoa or tell where I'd hid that stupid pelt or join the pirates or something else. Armed with that rationalization, I calmed down a little.

Smee gave me a speculative look. "Skip the anchor. It be too much t' waste on the likes o' one like 'im. Tie 'im up wi' manila and a twist o' the light chain."

"Just one? Are ye sure, Mr. Smee?" I was really getting annoyed with whoever this pirate asking all the questions was.

"Could be I be needin' four after all, Mr. Bart. One for the boy and three for those who be questionin' me authority."

There was a long moment of silence as the pirates surrounding us waited to see what the outcome in the battle of wills was going to be. There was a moment in which Mr. Bart seemed ready to take up the challenge but he finally lowered his eyes. "Aye, Mr. Smee. One chain and manila line." These were produced fairly quickly and before I knew it I'd been thoroughly tied up and my ankles shackled together with a long length of chain. My earlier rationalization was beginning to crumble just a bit as Mr. Clifton once more took the scruff of the bear pelt and propelled me to a plank jutting over the side of the ship that hadn't been there when I'd climbed aboard. I was carefully placed on the ship end of the plank. Mr. Bart gave me an evil grin as he replaced Mr. Clifton behind me.

"Just be trying something. I beg ye. Molly here ain't had a taste of the red stuff in quite awhile," he said quietly as he shook the black stained cutlass he was holding. "Why I might even make it quick-like."

"Belay that, Mr. Bart," came a shout from aft. It should have been impossible for Hook to have heard what Bart had been whispering to me but I was beginning to discover that there was lots of stuff that Hook was capable of doing which should have been impossible. Bart grumbled in a very, very quiet voice, but lowered the cutlass and gave Hook a respectable nod. "Mr. Smee, pipe the crew up please." Smee nodded at someone who played a few tones on some sort of a whistle. There was the sound of hatches crashing open and footfalls on deck as _The Jolly Roger's_ crew assembled around the area where Bart, Smee and I stood. Captain Hook joined us as the crowd of pirates parted to let him through. There were catcalls and yells from both the deck and the rigging of the ship. I was no longer rationalizing anything.

"Men," Captain Hook started in a quiet voice which silenced the crowd immediately. "Today I call on you to witness justice. This cur who stands before you is charged with and guilty of firing upon a ship's captain during a flag of truce." There was a low murmur of voices. "As such there can only be one punishment meted out." He turned to look at me. "Master Cubby you are indeed guilty of the bill of particulars and as such will walk the plank." The murmur quickly swelled to a roar of approval. Near the front of the crowd I heard pirates placing bets with one another on how big a splash I would make as I hit the water.

"But… But I'm just a kid," I managed to stammer out. "I don't want to die." This whole thing was impossible. I wasn't supposed to grow up but not because I was dead before I had the opportunity to. This was insane. I stepped off the plank, the chain around my ankle jangling as I moved. Bart struck with his cutlass and I quickly stepped back on the plank as I felt blood trickling down my side. There were guffaws of laughter.

"Is it not as I said, boy? Peter knew. He put you in that costume because he knew you were going to die quickly. Very quickly. In point of fact, I do believe you may have set a new record for speed of expiration. Would you not agree Mr. Smee?"

"Aye, Cap'n," Smee said woodenly.

"Any last words, boy?" Hook asked me in a solicitous voice. I froze as my eyes crossed his. They told me how much he was enjoying this and how he lived for it. They also conveyed something else but I was too terrified to figure anything that subtle out.

"I don't wanna die," I shrieked. "Please don't kill me. I'll do anything. Really I will. I don' wanna die alone." I started babbling and couldn't stop. I didn't even know what I was saying after I mentioned dying alone. I'd managed to scare myself more with that thought than about anything else I'd imagined so far.

"When Peter joins you in the Netherworld you can thank him yourself," Hook called out, laughing at the end. "Mr. Bart put this cur out of our misery please."

I don't remember anything about walking the plank. I think Bart stabbed at me a couple more times but I'm pretty sure I moved under my own power to the end of the plank. Below me I could see the greenish-blue water of the sea as it caused the ship and the overturned rowboat below to bob on its waves. I looked out at the island of Neverland, at the beach, the forest, and the mountains that rose behind them. I wished I could see Hangman's Tree from here but that was impossible. I wondered if Nibbler would be waiting for me when I died and didn't feel quite as alone as I had. I wished I could have told the rest of the Lost Boys goodbye which caused the loneliness to crash down again. The sky was blue and the sun was shining. There was a cloud that looked like a dragon. I wasn't screaming anymore but I was crying. Mr. Bart let me stand and stare for a moment that seemed like an hour and then shoved me with the flat of his cutlass. I fell like a rock.


	16. Chapter 16: A Swim, Snow, and Rangers

Before my body hit the water I was convinced that something was going to happen. I'd suddenly learn how to fly. The rope and chain binding me would dissolve so I could swim away. I'd hit the water and float. A seal would rescue me by dragging me to shore. All those possibilities flew through my mind as I fell from the plank off _The Jolly Roger_. It wasn't until the warm water closed over my head and I discovered the chain around my ankles was more than heavy enough to overcome my natural buoyancy that I started to panic. Some water went up my nose and I choked for a moment before I realized I had to hold my breath and couldn't cough. It was impossible for me to move my arms and while I could move my legs, it wasn't enough to help me get to the surface or anywhere else.

I struggled and twisted so hard that it took me a minute to realize something had grabbed me by my hair and was pulling hard enough that it hurt. My imagination was filled with all sorts of unspeakable sea monsters that were undoubtedly getting ready to eat me. Drowning was one thing, but being eaten alive was quite another. My head suddenly broke the surface of the water and smashed into something hard causing me to see stars in the darkness. The darkness caused by the fact that I'd been too scared to open my eyes at all. "Crikey," a familiar voice said. "Calm down, Cubbs. Oh, and open your eyes. That might help."

"Hurry up and cut his arms free so he can grab on," Leo said. His legs were paddling as hard as they could while he held me up on one side. Surefoot was on the other doing the same thing on my other side. In front of me in the dim light, I saw Red pull out his dagger and carefully cut the rope from around me.

"Don't let the rope go, we're low on it," Surefoot said as Red finished up. I coughed out some of the water that had gone up my nose.

"Shhhhhh. Be quiet. They'll hear you," Red whispered.

"Who?" I asked just as quietly. "And where are we?"

"The pirates, Furball. We're right under _The Jolly Roger_. Good thing you're so clumsy or I'm betting we wouldn't have had an upside down rowboat to hide under. That had your paw prints all over it" I could hear the smile in Leo's voice. "Can you lift your arms? Good. Reach up and grab that seat for a minute while we get that chain off your legs."

"Thank goodness," Surefoot said when I managed to grab hold and hang from the rowboat's middle seat. "Good thing you float cuz you're sort of heavy, you know?" He treaded water at a slower rate since he didn't have to help keep my head above water anymore.

"Where'd you guys come from?" I whispered. "I thought I was a goner."

"Are you kidding?" Leo asked. "Pan'd be really irritated if he found out we managed to let the newest Lost Boy get killed so fast. Ewwwwwwww." That last was because I'd suddenly realized what had almost happened and had thrown-up at the realization.

"You ready?" Red asked.

"I am now," Surefoot answered. Both of them dived and a moment later, I felt the chain around my ankles being moved back and forth. They reappeared under the boat a moment later. "Whatcha think?"

"It's pretty tangled but should only take a few more times. We gotta hurry though. No telling how long that rowboat is going to stay where it is before someone decides to turn it over." Red shook his head causing water to spray. "Plus my fingers are getting all prune-y"

It took several more dives before Red and Surefoot were able to untangle the chain and remove it from my ankles and the air under the rowboat got hot and fetid. While they were doing on freeing me from the chain, Leo kept me company. I tried to tell him what happened, but he only shook his head. "Don't worry about it now," he whispered. "They might hear us up there. It's okay."

I wasn't so sure about that but didn't say anything. I felt relieved at being rescued of course, but also so ashamed that I could hardly stand it. Finally I felt the chain's weight leave my ankles. It took a moment for me to get my arms to lower but I was finally able to gently tread water like the other three were doing. "You think you can swim to shore?" Leo asked after I'd been treading water for a little bit. I nodded my head. "Okay. Once we get to shore, you're going to have to run into the woods to get out of sight as quick as possible. Got it?"

"Yeah. But won't…"

Red grinned. "Don't worry about that. Wait and see." Leo slipped under the water again and was gone for a couple of minutes. "Anyone see ya?" Red asked when Leo reappeared.

"Just who we wanted."

Before I could ask what that meant, there was a muffled crowing. Even under the capsized rowboat we could hear the commotion on _The Jolly Roger_ as pirates started shouting. "C'mon, let's go," Surefoot said. The four of us dove under the water and swam as fast as we could for the beach. Now that I didn't have a chain wrapped around my ankles, I was positive my rump was above the water as I moved through it. When we reached the beach, I did a combination crawl/gallop as I tried to keep my balance. Red and Surefoot pulled me into the trees while Leo kept watch behind us. Once I was in the woods I turned around to see Peter Pan doing flying in circles and figure eights on the side of the ship facing the sea. Every pirate's eyes were on him as Hook yelled threats and insults at him while swinging his sword. A cannon roared but the shot didn't come close. There was the smaller roar of flintlock pistols and muskets but again none of those came close. Peter, apparently seeing us cross the beach and reach the woods, gave Hook a mocking salute and sailed through the air out to sea.

"Didn't I tell ya?" Red grinned. "C'mon. Let's get out of here." I followed Leo, Red and Surefoot deeper into the woods. After about 100 yards we ran into Roo, Stumble and Tigger. They were all armed to the teeth.

"I see you managed to rescue the Teddy Bear," Stumble said.

"I guess you didn't need us after all," Tig said to his twin. "Welcome back, Furball. How'd the meeting with Hook go?" He'd dropped his normal joking manner and looked as worried as it was possible for him to.

"Is Peter mad at me?" I asked Leo. "Are you?"

"Whatever gave you that idea?" He looked at me as though I had lost my mind. "You must of hit your head on that rowboat pretty hard. Maybe Roo should take a look at you."

"Naw, it's not that. It's just…" I wasn't sure what 'that' was, but was saved from answering by Tigger who thought it might be a good idea if we put a little more distance between ourselves and the pirates before they got to wondering why Pan had put in such a weird appearance.

We took off at a trot towards Hangman's Tree. As is normally the case I was bringing up the rear and Red dropped back to talk with me. "What happened?" I asked quietly so no one else could hear me.

Red looked around as though afraid that the trees we were passing by were eavesdropping. "I don't know, Cub. I'm sorry. I thought you were right behind me and then I heard voices and by the time I circled around and got back they were already taking you to the beach. The only thing I was able to do was go grab help."

"What'd you tell them?"

He looked guiltier. "I kinda told them that you got captured by pirates and I just happened to be passing by and couldn't do anything except get help."

I was upset for a moment. All I needed was everyone thinking I was so clumsy that I just wandered into the middle of a pirate trap. Of course, that's sort of what I had done, but at least a little bit of it was still Red's fault. Instead of getting mad, I just sighed and nodded. "No prob. It doesn't really matter anyway." He looked a little relieved when I said that, but I could still see the wheels turning in his mind and the guilt on his face. The good thing was that I was pretty sure it wouldn't last too long when he saw I wasn't going to make a big deal out of it.

"So what do you think happened to your friend? Do you think he ratted us out about the meeting and that's why the pirates were waiting for us?"

He shook his head 'no' so hard the hood of his fox pelt fell off his head. "No way. He'd never do that. Ever. Something else must have happened to him. I hope he's alright."

I wasn't so sure, but didn't say anything. The whole thing was just too convenient for me to accept. Plus pirates were always supposed to be the bad guys, not the good guys. That thought led me somewhere else. "What's the deal with Mr. Smee?"

Red shrugged. "Hook's first mate is all I know. Why?"

"He just seemed a lot different than I'd have figured he would. Like he wouldn't have killed me if he'd been given half a chance."

"I dunno about that. Maybe you should talk to Roo. I think he knows more about Smee than the rest of us do." I told him I would when I got a chance. I also wanted to tell Red the tiny bit I'd found out about the pelt, but we'd reached Hangman's Tree and I figured I'd tell him when everyone wasn't crowded around.

There was a lot of crowing and excitement as everyone found their trapdoors and slid into Hangman's Tree. As was normally the case, I sprawled on the common room floor when I hit the end of my slide, but I was used to it and had gotten so I liked the laughter it caused. The laughter annoyed Tink, and while I was on the ground, she flew overhead and sprinkled my rump with pixie dust. For the next hour I floated upside down from the ceiling of the common room. Peter came in and congratulated everyone on my rescue and told me I was becoming a real Lost Boy even if I didn't have enough sense not to get caught by pirates or had a thing for floating upside-down. I think he was joking, but sometimes it's hard to tell where Pan is concerned.

I eventually dozed off and only woke up when my head hit the floor as the pixie dust faded away. I gave a little bit more thought about the problem of the pelt, but shoved it out of my mind when we headed out to check the beaches for treasure. Not pirate treasure, but 'real' world treasure. I wasn't exactly sure where the dividing line between the 'real' world and Neverland was, but it seemed that a lot of 'real' world ships lost cargo in that area. One of the more interesting things had been finding a box that was half-full of Lego sets. Not as interesting was the case of corsets or the box of light bulbs.

After spending the rest of the day searching the southern beaches with Red, Surefoot, and Leo I returned with them to Hangman's Tree as the sun started to set, only a left sneaker with a hole in the side to show for our efforts. Still, I'd spent a lot of time wading along with the others and was pretty sure I was going to have sunburned arms and face. It was a pretty weird way to end a day that had begun with me walking the plank at one point. I skipped dinner, which caused a lot of sarcastic comments from Stumble, and climbed under the common room table. I was worried about Nightmares and was a little apprehensive about falling asleep. I thought about tying Leo and Tigger's tails together since they both hung down from their chairs within reach of where I was, but fell into a dreamless sleep before I started to act on it.

The next morning I opened my eyes and crawled out from under the common room table to find the place empty. I went over to the stew pot that was bubbling over the fire and scooped up a gourd full out of it. After taking a slurp, I took a closer look. The liquid was an alarming shade of greenish-brown and very runny. There were a couple of acorns along with some pine needles, a mushroom that looked suspiciously like a toadstool, a few chunks of stuff that could only be described as mystery meat or fish, and a plant with 'leaves of three'. Even though my stomach was busy rumbling as though I was starving, I decided I wasn't hungry and poured the gourd's contents back into the pot. I figured it would probably be a good idea to find some fruit or berries while I was out.

A few minutes later I stuck my head out of my trapdoor and got nailed with a snowball. I was surprised for a lot of reasons, the main one being that yesterday it had been sunny and summer-warm. Now the clouds seemed to be hovering a few feet above me and there were a few snowflakes falling from them. The snowball caught me on the back of the head and I tumbled out of Hangman's Tree into a snowdrift about a meter high. "About time, Furball," Tigger crowed as he launched another handful of snow in my direction.

"What happened?" I asked as the snow hit my chest and exploded in all directions.

"I'd have thought that was obvious. I've nailed you with two snowballs and am getting ready to do it again."

"No, I mean the weather."

"Ah," he said, this time launching the snowball in his twin's direction right before he caught one himself on the arm from Surefoot. "Either Peter left the island to go visiting somewhere or the elves have been messing around with the weather again. Either way, it won't last long, usually a week or so. Now ice, that's something different."

"It'll be around long enough for someone to get frostbite," Roo added in a sour voice.

I grinned despite Roo's dire prediction of frostbite. He tended to exaggerate just a little when it came to what he might end up having to heal. Besides, this was the first snow of any decent amount I'd ever been in. Back in the 'real' world, it was sleet or a couple of centimeters of snowfall that made up a 'snowstorm' where I'd been, so I was just itching to make my first snowball and hurl it. I packed one, causing my fingers to go instantly numb and hurled it at Red. It didn't come close but did make a satisfying thump when it hit a tree trunk.

"C'mon," Surefoot urged. "We oughta go to that field by the Little Bear River and have a real snowball fight and make forts and stuff like that." The suggestion was met with a bunch of howls of agreement and we took off.

As we hiked towards the field, I sped up a bit so I could catch up with Red. He'd been uncharacteristically quiet so far and I wanted to see what was going on. "Hey," I said as I walked next to him.

"Oh, hi," he said, his eyes suddenly interested in the ground in front of him.

"What about pirates?" I asked. He gave me a questioning look and I pointed back the way we'd come. "Can't they tell where the Tree is from the tracks?"

"Oh," he said in a relieved tone. I guess he figured I was going to bring up what happened yesterday or something. "Naw. The pirates don't ever come ashore when it snows. They know it usually means Peter's gone off somewhere and they figure they have a better chance of shooting him out of the sky if they're on board _The Jolly Roger_. Plus, Hook's got some sort of superstition about snow. He thinks it hides the spirits of all the Lost Boys he's killed and that they're waiting in ambush for him.

"Where'd he ever get an idea like that?" I asked as I turned my head to look at Red, which caused me to go heels-over-head after stepping into a hole that was covered by the snow. Everyone laughed, but Stumble thought this was so hysterically funny and laughed at me so loudly two ravens took off from the tree they were squawking in. Red produced the first grin I'd seen that day as he helped me up. I couldn't help but laugh at myself either, especially now that my pelt was caked in snow. Still, I didn't think it was as hilariously funny as Stumble continued to make it out to be. "Is it true?" I asked as we started out again.

"Is what true? Oh, you mean the spirits waiting for Hook? Naw. Least, I don't think it is." He called ahead to Tig who said he knew of the story but didn't know how true it was either but allowed he knew stranger things about the island that were true.

We continued trudging towards the field. I was a little surprised that I hadn't heard the sounds of the Little Bear River yet, but didn't pay much attention to it. Red suddenly stopped and looked at me. "Look, about yesterday. I'm sorry what happened. I didn't know we were walking into a group of pirates and didn't mean to leave you behind. I thought you were following me and by the time I found you weren't, all I could do was…

I shrugged, not knowing what else to do. "You still managed to save my life," I pointed out. "I also found out that Hook seems to be as upset about that stupid pelt as Peter is."

Red mulled that over a bit. "So what're you going to do now?"

"I dunno. Part of me says the best thing to do is just bury it or give it to Nibbler to put to rest or stick it in one of those places in the Tree that seem to collect all sorts of junk." I paused and when I continued was talking as much to myself as I was Red. "There's just something about it that won't let go. It's almost like there's something forcing or pulling me to find out whom it belonged to and why it ended up on Hook's ship. Now I must sound as though I've gone crazy.

"Oh, yeah. Totally crazy. Just as crazy as ending up in a place where you wear a bear pelt, fight pirates and have a lot of conversations with a dead Lost Boy whose job it is to ferry the rest of us over when we move on to the next adventure."

"But none of that really seems crazy. At least not like I uses it might have not so long ago when I was still in the 'real' world. It sounds more normal than some of the stuff I used to go through in the 'real' world.

Red gave me a quick grin. "Tell me about it. Why do you think you got 'rescued' by Pan? It sure ain't cuz you fit in so well back there."

"I've never really fit in anywhere," I said in a quiet voice. I wasn't feeling sorry for myself or anything, it was simply one of those things that is. There were still times that I even thought I was a misfit as a Lost Boy.

Red gave me a look of sympathy and then his eyes filled with a horrible, terrible sadness. He opened his mouth and started saying something before stopping himself. He shook as if resetting himself and I know for just an instant he had started to tell me how Peter had rescued him and from what. Instead he asked if I was still going to search for the story behind the pelt.

"Yeah," I decided on the fly. "It's like it's something I'm supposed to do. Does that make any sense at all?"

"Sure. Everyone who ends up here has to discover something or conquer some sort of challenge."

"I thought mine was not wetting my pants the first time I went on a raid against the pirates or managing to fit through my trapdoor," I said, trying to make it into a joke. Both events had been challenging, though.

He shook his head. "Seriously. We all went through it. Some of us more than once."

"What was yours?"

Before he answered, there was some yelling and a mad dash for the center of the field now in front of us. Using rock, paper, scissors, water (water rusts scissors and dissolves paper but rock splashes water—according to the 'Rules of Tigger'), Stumble and Tigger were chosen as captains for the snowball fight. Stumble chose Surefoot and Tig chose his twin. When Stumble chose next, he called both Red and Roo.

"No fair. You can't choose two at once," Tig protested. His objection caused most of us to laugh since he'd managed to change or add to the rules of every game we played. The last time we played 'tic-tac-toe' he took a half-hour to explain the rules to us that he swore were in existence as well as the fact that the way we played was an 'abridged' version.

"I don't wan't the teddy bear and he's big enough for two… heck, almost three normal Lost Boys." I felt my face turn red.

"I'd have chosen Furball anyway," Tig said a little heatedly. "He's strong as an ox… uh, any two Lost Boys and I'll take that any day." He looked like he wanted to say more, but all the psychic energy I was hurling towards him, begging him not to, must have caught. He just turned and started telling me and Leo about his plan to conquer the other side.

There was something about Stumble that I wasn't sure about. A lot of the time he'd treat me the same as he treated anyone else. Then there were the times he'd tease me about being clumsy, cowardly, or tubby. Of course everyone else did too, including myself. Yet with everyone else it was always them laughing with me. After all, I am clumsy cowardly and tubby and I knew it. Stumble, though, mixed a lot of meanness in with it more than a few times. "Sometimes I think Stumble doesn't like me a whole lot," I said, again trying to make it sound a little like a joke, but curious to see what the response would be.

The twins exchanged a look that spoke volumes. Unfortunately, the volumes were written in a language I didn't know. Tig nodded at his brother, deferring to him. "It's not you so much, but what…"

For the second time I missed out what was going to be said as a clash of arms echoed across the field and caused us all to look at the woods on the other side. Mounted on unicorns and horses were a troop of ten elven rangers. The apparent leader was white haired and looked old, which for an elf, marked him as ancient. "What say you men?" he called out to his patrol. "Mayhap this group of miscreants is a group of notorious and desperate Lost Boys that needs be overcome and routed from the realm?" There were cries of "Aye" and laughter from the men as they dismounted. The leader walked over to us stiffly, as though his leg was bothering him, and came to stand in front of Leo. By this time, Stumble and his team had joined us. Leo and the ranger leader exchanged salutes. "Seeing how battleworks have yet to be assembled, shall we say a half-turning of the glass before we commence battle?"

"Agreed, Captain," Leo replied. "If the 'corns want to join, both teams get half. Oh, and the white ones get evenly split between the two teams."

The elven captain put on a look of mock chagrin and then agreed with a grin. "Wait a second," Tigger said. "They outnumber us."

"Come now, lad. It's my understanding that a certain rogue in orange and black costume has claimed that he is as good as a trio of elves." Leo looked at his twin who'd turned bright red, in amused surprise.

"I was talking about those three guys that are always giving us trouble," Tig muttered into his pelt. I'd never seem him actually embarrassed about anything before.

"If you'll let me leave the field of battle, I can find three to take the field on our team," Roo spoke up.

"No trolls," both Leo and the captain said at the same time.

"C'mon, give me some credit," Roo said, rolling his eyes. "I'll be back before we being with 'em, okay?" He ran off into the woods as Leo gave his approval.

"No ice," Leo stated.

"No rocks," the captain came back with.

"No magic."

"No daggers," the captain said with a grin. Leo almost managed to look hurt at the suggestion.

"Agreed?" Leo asked.

"Agreed," the captain responded. Both of them spat on their palms and shook on it. Right after that, both the elves and us started building snow forts. About halfway through our preparations, Roo showed up with Luke and Josh, two of the Indians I'd met before, as well as a third whom Luke introduced to me as 'she who treads lightly over the snow like a doe but can give black eye'. Josh rolled his eyes at the same time the newcomer bopped Luke on the back of his head. Josh and Luke claimed that they preferred 'Indian' to any other term but Luke always came up with these long involved names that sounded as if they were from a bad western.

"You're lucky I don't decide to give _you_ a black eye," she growled at Luke. She turned to me and grinned. "My name's Ophelia, and don't ask. You're the new kid, aren't you?"

"Yeah, that's 'Bear who can't leave blueberries alone'," Luke said laughing. I tried to decide if that was better than last time when he'd christened me 'Galloping Bear.' He took a couple of steps back as Ophelia raised both an eyebrow and a fist.

"I'm Cubby," I said, suddenly feeling flustered.

"C'mon, Furball," Tig advised. "You can moon over her later. Right now we gotta finish. It's almost time."

We finished up and the epic battle started. The elves had built a much better fort than ours but our rate of fire was a lot faster than theirs was. After an hour the elves had an edge because our snow fort had crumbled to a small snow bank under their barrage.

"What're we going to do now?" Red asked. "We can't get near 'em without being mowed down by snow and our fort is non-existent."

"No worries, we'll just use our secret weapon to destroy their fort."

"What secret weapon?" Ophelia asked Leo skeptically.

"Watch and learn," Leo said with a smirk. "Hey, Furball. Stand right here." He pointed to an area in front of the small pile of snow we were pretending was a snow fort. I waited to be pelted from the other side, but the elves were apparently just as curious as I was about what was going to happen. While Leo was getting me into 'perfect' position, Tig was telling everyone to grab as much ammo as they could carry and then directing them to stand behind me.

"Uh, Leo…"

"Don't worry, Cub. You'll do great. They won't know what hit 'em." With those words, he moved the last person in position and then both he and Tig got behind me. "Run for all you're worth and when you get to their fort bellyflop into it."

"Run?"

"Don't worry, me and Tig'll help." Before I could give a thought to that, both Leo and Tigger were pushing me to the 'no boys land' between the two lines, the rest of our team following behind. When the elves saw what was happening, they started launching snowball after snowball. I quickly became covered in snow, but the two behind me made sure I didn't falter. With a loud war cry (Red swears it was 'blueberries' but I think he's lying) I leaped as high as I could and performed a perfect bellyflop on top of the elves' snow fort. The wall crumbled beneath me and the elves didn't stand a chance as the rest of my team swarmed over me and into the fort. I'm not really sure they needed to use me as a bridge with the walls down, but I was too happy to care.

There was a lot of laughter on both sides and the elven captain presented Leo with a small silver dagger as a token of superior leadership. The other elves shared hot chocolate that they magically produced before the rangers bid us farewell. Luke, Josh and Ophelia, decided they had to leave and bid us farewell too.

"Secret weapon?" Ophelia asked me, with a comradely laugh. "That's perfect. Hey, pull your hood down for a minute." I pulled the head of the bear pelt down and felt my red hair spring out all over. Ophelia grinned at the sight. "I could have guessed," she said. She poked the tip of my nose with her finger. "Stay safe, Cubby." There were a dozen replies I was ready to give as she and Luke and Josh left, but for some reason I was incapable of speech. Red smirked at my confusion but didn't say anything.

"Hey! You know what we gotta do now, don't ya?" Surefoot yelled out. "We have to go skating before everything melts. We're near that pond that empties into the river and it's perfect.


	17. Chapter 17: Skating, Stumble & Slider

I wasn't entirely convinced that the ice skating plan was a good thing. I'd never been ice skating before and it didn't sound like the ideal activity for someone as clumsy as I could be. I'd been roller skating before and both my knees and palms had a couple of scars from that time. Still, it wasn't as though I had much choice in the matter as we headed towards the river. "We skate on the river?" For some reason that made me uncomfortable. "Do we have skates?"

"Sometimes we do. Skate on the river, that is," Red explained. He seemed a lot happier than he had earlier. I guess a snowball fight will do that for you. "There's this pond that's right by the river where we normally go to skate. It's good for playing hockey and stuff." We moved through an area that didn't have any trees and I was surprised at how big the drifts were. In a few locations, they were taller than I was. The snow had stopped falling and shafts of sunlight peered through the clouds, although they were thick enough to still threaten more of the white stuff.

I nodded. I'd seen hockey played a time or two but didn't have a clue as to what was going on except that getting the small round black thing into a net was obviously good. It looked as though fighting might also be part of it. "What about skates?" I had a vision of some sort of wooden clog thing on wooden runners.

"Naw. It' normally doesn't freeze long enough to bother with making any. We just slide on the ice with our pawmocs. They work really well."

I heaved a silent sigh of relief. I'd done a lot of ice sliding before. It wasn't graceful but I figured it would be better than what me being on skates would look like.

"Wish I knew how long it was going to stay cold this time," Roo said to no one in particular.

"Wait a second," Tig yelled, causing us all to stop. "Hey, Furball, climb up that snow pile." I shrugged but managed to climb to the top of it. Tig whispered to his brother and they both climbed up the drift and joined me. "Okay guys, start scooping." In total bewilderment, I helped dig a hole down the center of the snow. It wasn't hard and with all three of us digging, it didn't take long to make a decent sized hole. "Okay, Cub. Get in. When I say now, pop out and stand straight up, okay?"

"I guess," I said, scratching my head trying to figure out what was going on. I sank into the hole as the twins slid back down to where the others were.

It only took a few moments before Tig called out, "Okay, Furball."

I scrambled up out of the hole and stood on the edge, swaying a little to keep my balance. As I reached the top, a hole in the clouds wandered over and filled the area with sunlight.

"Alright," Tig crowed, you know what that means.

"Not really," Leo said. "Take a close look. He doesn't have a shadow."

"Huh? He has to. The sun's out and we do." I started turning trying to see it, but he was right. There wasn't any shadow.

"Maybe it wasn't sewn on tightly enough. Didn't that happen to Peter once?" Red asked as he verified that he still had one.

"This isn't funny," I said, still trying to locate it. "Anyway, I ain't a groundhog, I'm a bear." I mis-stepped and tumbled down the side of the snowdrift, getting covered in snow again.

"You got half of it right, anyway," Stumble muttered.

"Look! His shadow is back," Surefoot said, pointing to where it had reappeared on the ground.

"That's weird. I guess all this will melt soon then," Tigger said sighing. "Maybe I shouldn't have done that."

We continued on to the pond. I turned around frequently to make sure my shadow was still following me. The snow on the ground decreased as we ran into another flock of trees and our shadows merged in and out of the dappled shadows on the ground. The trees ended almost right where the pond began with only a small strip of bare ground between them and the frozen water. We stood looking at the ice-covered pond for a moment.

"How do we know it's frozen enough?" Surefoot asked. "It hasn't been that cold very long."

"It's always been frozen before," Tig pointed out.

"Why don't we shove the teddy bear out there? If he don't break through, it sure won't crack under the rest of us."

I glared at Stumble who looked back at me as if hoping I'd try to start something. Leo looked from me to Stumble and looked as though he was getting ready to do or say something. Before he could do anything, I snorted and clumped out onto the ice, half expecting it to give way. There was a creaking sound halfway through, but it wasn't under where I was and I don't think I did it. When I stood in the center of the pond, I stomped my foot a couple of times. There was no reaction from the ice. "Are you happy?" I yelled at Stumble as loudly as I could, my words echoing back from the trees. Some snow fell from the branches of a pine tree, but that was probably a coincidence.

Stumble's look was hard to describe. I figured it'd be anger or the smugness he showed a lot, but it was completely different. Guilty and a little upset, maybe. Even sad. I jumped up and down twice, which was a big mistake because ice is slick. I fell on my rump so hard I saw stars. After a couple of attempts to get back to my feet, I finally made it. Surprisingly, Stumble didn't say a word. I glared at him, but his expression didn't change at all. Upset more at myself than anyone else, I started stomping back towards the others. I got about halfway back when there was a loud cracking sound. Before I could even think about running back to shore, the ice disintegrated below me and I plunged into the water.

Frigid water isn't a lot of fun. There's that whole 'cold' thing that occurs along with violent shivering and numbness. I rose to the surface, sputtering water, and tried to grab the edge of the ice. All that happened was that either my grip slipped or the ice I was grabbing broke off from the rest of the ice. I managed two attempts at grabbing something before I slipped under the surface again. Underwater a couple of eel looking things swam past, suddenly appearing out of the dark, murky water. As I slowly sank to the bottom, I could hear some sort of thumping noise through the water and made out something moving on the ice above. When I hit the scum-covered bottom of the pond, I flexed my knees and pushed up as hard as I could.

My head broke the water's surface again but I was facing the wrong way to grab anything. I flailed around, in full panic mode by this time, and started sinking again, the weight of my pelt dragging me under. I'd almost gone under again when something grabbed my hair and the hood of the bear pelt and started pulling. I started to wish my head had gone numb too. Slowly pulled forward by hair and hood, the ice I was on cracking beneath my weight, a voice yelled almost in my ear, "Pull harder. He's even heavier when he's sopping wet." The voice sounded a lot like Stumble. My scalp felt like it was on fire, but the stuff beneath me finally stopped breaking up, as ice became dirt and gravel. The back of my pelt was grabbed, along with one of my arms, and I was hauled up near the trees. I lay their panting and coughing while I smelled the pine needles that covered the ground. There was some mumbling and discussion about whether it would be better to try to build a fire where we were, or to get me back to Hangman's Tree as quickly as possible.

I was beyond caring a whole lot about anything when someone's yelling made it through the haze I was playing in. Someone started pounding me on the back and I wondered if this was some sort of weird 'warm-up' procedure. Before I got very far with that thought, I was violently turned over and Stumble jumped on me, his knees landing in my stomach.

"You idiot," he screamed so loudly it hurt my ears. "You big, dumb, stupid, jerk. You don't belong here. What were you trying to prove? Were you trying to kill yourself like he did?" Stumble's face was bright red and seemed to glow against the black and grey background of his raccoon pelt, his expression one of rage and fear. As he screamed at me, his fists smacked my chest and face and I tasted blood right before he closed my left eye. I could have fought back, but I was so shocked by the way he was acting, along with something else I couldn't figure out, that I couldn't strike back or even defend myself. I kept thinking it would be wrong to. The others must have been just as shocked, because it took a couple of moments before Tig, Leo, and Red moved to pull Stumble off me. That was something I didn't let Red forget for awhile.

Things were pretty fuzzy after that happened. I don't remember a whole lot except that I ended up back at Hangman's Tree with everyone except Stumble. Red told me that everyone except Stumble had carried me back at a dead run to make sure I didn't freeze to death. He also let me know it took almost a whole bag of pixie dust to lift me up to my trapdoor in Hangman's Tree. Red made sure I didn't forget that for awhile. Then he told me that Stumble had run off right after the fight.

"Did anyone look for him?" I asked, squinting. My left eye hurt a lot and was swollen so I couldn't see much out of it. My jaw ached as I asked the question.

"No yet. We were too busy lugging you here, Furball. How you feel, anyway?"

I groaned as I got to my feet but it was more for dramatic effect than anything else. I was sore in a few places and felt scalded in a couple more, but I was dry and no longer freezing. I looked at the stew-pot bubbling over the fire that I'd been almost too close to. "I gotta go find him."

"After what he did to you? Tig asked. "Are you nuts? Besides, you can't track worth beans."

"Then it's a good thing I ain't tracking beans, ain't it?"

"Aw, quit bugging him, Tig," his twin advised. "It's not like Stumble was trying to sneak away when he took off. He left a track a mile wide. And it's not as though we don't know where he's probably gone to anyway."

Roo spoke up in a tone that indicated this wasn't the first time he'd said it. "Well what did you think he was going to do? It's not as though he hasn't been moping about it since it happened. He thinks the whole thing was his fault to begin with and he doesn't know what to do about it."

"That doesn't explain why he beat the crud out of Furball," Tig said rather heatedly. "Just because Cubby can't fight back and is too scared to do much of anything…"

"Hello! I'm right here. I can hear ya, you know."

Tig had the grace to look at least a little embarrassed. "You know what I mean," he finally recovered. "It's not that you couldn't take any of us on and probably wipe the ground up with us…"

"Speak for yourself," Surefoot said with a grin.

"…but you won't and he knows that and it wasn't fair that he did it. Bad enough he did it to one of us to begin with."

"So where's he at?" I asked Leo.

Leo shrugged. "I don't _know_ that he's there, but I'm pretty sure that he's at Lost Boys' Field."

"Why would he be there?" I could think of a lot of places I might end up at if I were running away, but Lost Boys' Field wasn't one of them. In fact, if it weren't for the occasional game of checkers with Nibbler or some of the questions I'd had about the pelt, I couldn't think of any reason to head that way. At least the orchard had apples.

Leo and Tigger looked at each other. I could tell they were getting upset because they started finishing each other's sentences. That was usually a good sign that they were either very worried or getting irritated with each other. "He'd go there because…" Leo started.

"…of what happened earlier…" Tig continued.

"…a few days before you got here."

"He's been there…"

"…a couple of times before…"

"…because he blames himself for…"

"…what happened and is trying…"

"…to get forgiven, I guess."

"What happened?" I said in exasperation. I suddenly had the feeling everything was moving too slowly and that if things didn't happen quickly a disaster would occur.

Tig and Leo looked at each other, both of their expressions clouded with doubt. I think that scared me more than anything so far. Leo was never doubtful about anything or at least never let on that he was. "We can't tell you…"

"…what happened before because it was before…"

"…you got here and you know what the first unwritten-written…"

"…rule is. Only the Lost Boy that stuff happened to…"

"…can tell another Lost Boy what happened and he has to tell you…"

"…his self because you can't ask him."

"But I thought that was stuff that happened like before a Lost Boy was rescued by Peter. You know, the reason that they were rescued. All of you know what happened, right?" Everyone except Roo, Leo and Tigger shook their heads.

"We know _what_ happened, but we don't know _how_ or _why_ it happened," Red explained to me. "There was another Lost Boy and he…"

I waited for Red to continue, but he just looked down at the ground. "Not the one who owned the pelt I found?" I asked, doubtfully. If that had been the case, I figured someone would have told me, but wasn't sure enough of it to believe it thoroughly. I'd found a lot of things get left stuck between the lines and I was as guilty of it as anyone.

"Naw, we'd of told you that," Red said. "Slider was an otter."

"Oh," I said because I didn't know what else to say that I thought might get some answers. "Okay. I'm going to Lost Boys' Field," I said out loud as I decided in my muddled mind to make the trip.

"We'll come with you," Tig and Leo said in unison.

"No," Roo and I replied in unison. I didn't even want to think about the implications of that. "Look," Roo continued, "this whole thing is between Cubbs and Stumble and you know why," indicating Leo and Tigger. "It's not as though Stumble could really hurt Cubby, even if he wanted to, which I don't think he does. He's scared."

"Which one?" Surefoot asked, smirking.

"Maybe," Leo admitted, ignoring Surefoot. "But if he's not there, come back and get us so we can hunt for him. He better not be taking any Midnight Walk."

Roo shrugged. "It's possible, but it's a few hours 'til midnight."

I was given a lot of advice concerning a lot of things, most of which I managed to forget quickly except for Roo who told me I ought to check with Nibbler. "Be careful," he added.

"It's okay. I don't think Stumble will do anything to me. At least nothing that'd be bad enough to kill me."

"I don't think so either, but that's not what I was talking about. It's something else. We argue a lot sometimes, and there's even the occasional shoving match, but whenever one of us draws blood from another of us something bad always happens."

"Oh," I said because again I wasn't sure what to say to that. Of course with Roo 'something bad' could range from being forced to take a bath (okay, actually that was more what I considered bad) to having your head chopped off, to being banished from the island forever. After receiving promises that if I didn't show up soon, they'd be coming to look for me, I left Hangman's Tree.

My mouth was still sore but a little of the swelling had gone from around my eye, so I could see a little better. It was dusk, moving to dark, and it had started to snow again. The moon shown through the clouds above and I could have sworn I saw what looked like a rainbow caused by the snow falling through moonbeams. A rainbow arc except that this looked like it was covered with frost and was made up of dark purple, dark blue, light black, gray, and very dark orange. It didn't take a long time to get to the huge oak tree that stood sentinel over the place where Lost Boys started their next adventure. Nibbler was standing under the tree, busy creating a snow-ship. He seemed solid enough except for the fact that snow was falling through him. I wondered how that could happen when he was obviously able to move and shape the snow into a ship. "I thought you'd be here," he said as he sculpted a wave coming off the bow of the ship and adding a mermaid.

"That's pretty awesome," I said. I looked around the field. "Is Stumble here?"

"Just like he's been every night since Slider died." My heart stopped for a second before deciding to continue pumping even though I'd more-or-less figured out that's what had happened. "You're the first person who's actually said he died."

Nibbler shrugged, the ears of his rabbit-skin bouncing up and down. "Death may be the next adventure, but that doesn't mean Lost Boys like to talk about it that much. Staying forever young ain't the same thing as being immortal. Slider and Stumble were sort of best friends. Slider wasn't exactly small, he could do almost anything in the water and he liked to climb trees too. Sort of like you. I think you come a little too close to what Slider was like. Stumble will tell you the rest, more than likely, but you're going to have to dig for it. It's going to depend on how much you want to know what he has to say." He sighed, stood up, and scattered the snow ship he'd built with his foot. "Stumble's down in the bottoms at the other side." He gave a whistle and a lightning bug appeared. "He'll show you the way," Nibbler told me before he looked up at the sky. "You don't often see a snowbow at night. The colours are all different. It'll mean something will happen."

The lightning bug started flying in a circle as if impatient to begin. I thanked Nibbler and promised him I'd come back in a day or two to play checkers with him before following the lightning bug. I hadn't taken but a dozen steps when Nibbler whistled after me. I turned. "Hey, this might come in handy sometime." He tossed me a small globe of what looked like some type of quartz. It was a little smaller than a baseball but a lot heavier and weighed the pocket of my pelt down when I dropped it in. "Bring some carrots when you come next time, please." I promised I would and continued after the bug, wondering if Nibbler really liked carrots that much or believed we expected him to.

There were a lot of large paw prints in the snowy field, about the same size as the ones I was leaving, along with a snow unicorn and a snow dragon. I followed the lightning bug through the field while wondering what would happen if a snowflake hit it. Did such things bother it, or would it end up crashing because of it. I tried to hold a hand above it to keep the snowflakes off, but it made a loud buzzing sound that I'd expect more from a bumblebee until I took my hand away. As we continued walking, it seemed as though Stumble simply appeared from the ground as we approached where he was sitting. The lightning bug circled my head twice and then headed off in the direction we'd come. I waited for a moment and watched Stumble's back before walking the remaining distance and sitting down next to him. I was careful enough to sit a bit more than an arm's distance away from him.

"Go away. You don't belong here," Stumble said. It wasn't loud nor was it a demand and it ended in a snuffle. I didn't say anything, but simply sat there looking at the ground and wishing I knew what the heck to say. I could have told him I knew how he felt, and in a way I did, but not in any way which would count or be believable. I thought about asking him if he was okay, but the answer to that was painfully obvious. I continued to simply sit and look at the ground.

"Why don't you go away and leave me alone? This ain't none of your business or anything. Just leave me alone." The only emotion was the sniffling between some of the words. He didn't speak with any emotion and the words came out as if he was describing his recipe for stew.

"I'm hungry," I said. It made absolutely no sense at all and I couldn't have explained why I'd said it if my life had depended on it. For some reason I thought about the stupid stewpot back at Hangman's Tree bubbling over the fire without him tending it as he normally did.

"Big deal. It's not like you could go a few days without eating. Stupid teddy bear. How Pan could ever think…"

"Think what?"

"Nothing." He wiped his nose on his sleeve before grabbing some snow and making a snowball, which he tossed from hand-to-hand.

"Think what?" I pressed again. I kept a wary eye on his fists. "Think what?" I said again, when all he did was shake his head.

"Think that you could replace Slider," he choked out as he crushed the snowball in one of his hands. "You're nothing like him at all. He was a lot better than you were at everything. You're going to get someone killed because you're a coward and you'll freeze up when someone needs you to help him. Just like what happened the other day."

"I didn't freeze, I was caught and couldn't get away. I did _not_ freeze up." Not that it mattered since I sort of agreed with what Stumble was saying, but I figured not agreeing might get him angry, or angrier, and get him to talking. "Did _you_ freeze up?"

Stumble's breath caught and for a moment, the only sound I heard was the sound of the snow drifting to the ground. It's funny, but a lot of people don't think snow makes any noise when it falls. This time I was ready when Stumble erupted. "I didn't freeze. I didn't freeze. I didn't freeze," he said in time with the punches he tried to land. He was swinging so blindly and wildly that they weren't hard to dodge, but I did get caught in the cheek once. "It. Wasn't. My. Fault." He said, gasping for breath between each world. "He's down there and he's alone in the dark and cold and nothing can help him." The punches had winded down and he fell back to the ground. "I want to die," he keened.

"But you didn't die before, did you?" I quietly asked him.

"Didn't what?"

"Didn't die."

Stumble looked at me as if I'd lost my mind, not that such an event would have been unbelievable. At some point when he'd been trying to slug me, the head of his raccoon pelt was back and the falling snow was beginning to turn his brown hair white. "What do you mean I didn't die? What are you talking about?"

"When you were rescued by Peter. Didn't you want to die then, too? I know I sure did and probably would have if I hadn't been rescued by him."

"Yeah," he said very slowly, dragging the word out, his nose wrinkling as he thought. "I did too. It was horrible." He looked wistful for a moment and then replaced it with a look of resolve. "But what's that got to do with anything?"

That was a question I'd have given a lot to answer. I didn't know where I was going and it was like my muddled mind had decided just blurting out random stuff was better than thinking about stuff. I can't say I really disagreed with it. "Cuz when you were rescued, you didn't replace anyone. Right?"

While Stumble mulled that over for a few minutes, I stuck my paws as deep into the pelt's pockets as they would go so I'd quit wringing them. "No. There were only six others when I got here. There were four but the twins arrived before me and they made six." He let out a huge breath, pulled the hood of the raccoon pelt back on top of his head, sat there, and continued looking down at the ground.

"Thanks for pulling me out of the water," I finally ventured, prepared for an eruption.

"I dunno why I did it. It doesn't matter, anyway. If I hadn't, someone else would have. If we don't look after each other, no one else is. You know why we all become Lost Boys, don't ya?" I shook my head no, not wanting to say anything. "Because we can't be in the 'real' world. No one cares or understands or worries. We just are. We're not even as good as strays. Even in the 'real' world, everyone grows up except us and we either get rescued by Peter or we get trapped wandering in a world where we'll always be misfits and forgotten. Forgotten if we're lucky. Then we get here and we find the best friends and brothers that anyone could ever have. We think we've found a place to fit in and belong. Even if the pirates want to kill us and the elves hate us and the dwarves tolerate us. We'd kill for each other and we'd die for each other." His voice had gotten high and threatened to break with each word, but suddenly got rock-steady again. I was doing everything I could, including gnawing the inside of my cheek, to keep from bawling. I knew exactly what he meant and what he felt even without the empathy that made me feel like I was close to drowning for the second time that day. "I'd have died for Slider. I'd have done it with a grin on my face. I'd have done it knowing it was the reason for my rescue and happy knowing it. The big, dumb jerk." He yelled and screamed and cursed at the clouds. The snow continued to fall.

"Why does that happen?" he demanded when he finished cursing the uncaring sky above. "What right does anyone or anything have to do something like that?"

"Because it's what he wanted to do, too. Don't you think he felt the same way you did?" I was taking a huge leap here. I only had the barest clue as to what happened and I'm as clumsy in thought as I am in deed, so I muttered a quick wish to whatever star might be above the clouds that I wasn't making anything worse. "Weren't you his best friend as much as he was yours?"

"Yeah, I hope so."

"So what happened?" I held my breath. I'd swear I could see him wavering, trying to decide which way to come down. I vowed to myself that I wasn't going to say another word until he had first. The silence lasted so long I felt like jumping up and screaming or yelling. Anything to keep it from blanketing us like the snow was.

"It was a cave," he said after an eternity. "I used to love to explore caves all the time and found this really cool one in the Southern Wood." I got a funny feeling when I heard that because Stumble wouldn't go into any cave for any reason. "It wasn't really a cave, but more like an old dwarven mine they'd abandoned. It was pretty rickety and there were a lot of supports that were rotten, but I figured it hadn't fallen yet so it never would. I begged Slider to go exploring with me. He didn't want to, but I said it was because he was scared to and kept bugging him 'til he agreed. He kept saying it was weird that we'd never noticed the place before since it was on one of the main paths. I didn't really pay any attention to it because I wanted to see what was inside. So we went in and got ambushed by pirates. I dunno if they were using it for something themselves or they had set a trap for us but Slider pushed me to the ground as one of them swung a sword at us. It missed me completely but got Slider in the side. He grabbed an iron bar and started swinging it keeping the pirates back even though his side was covered in blood. I tried to help him but he pushed me out the entrance." Stumble stopped talking and sniffled. "I fell over but got back up and started to run towards the cave. I had my dagger out. Slider looked at me and I saw him grin. Even though it was dark inside the cave and daylight outside, I saw him grin and he told me 'goodbye'. Another pirate managed to stab him and I saw him swing that stupid iron bar at one of the roof supports and the whole stupid roof of the cave came down. He knew that there was no way I'd have been able to escape from them so the idiot killed himself. He killed himself to save me." Somewhere above us, there was an opening in the clouds and for a moment the moon bathed the whole meadow in light as if making sure everything was okay before the clouds abruptly closed up. I was pretty sure I'd seen something big standing in the woods beside the meadow in that moment but ignored it.

I wished Roo were here instead of me. Roo knew how to handle stuff like this. He'd have known exactly what to say and everything would have been okay. All I could do was sit here feeling like I really needed to say something and not having a clue as to what it should be. I inanely wondered how long it had taken to recover Slider's body and what that had done to Stumble. "He killed himself to save you because you were his best friend. Just like you'd have done for him, right?" There was no answer. "Right?" I demanded a bit louder.

"Don't you think I know that?" he asked plaintively. "Just like I know if I hadn't begged him to go into that place to begin with he'd still be alive?" He hopped to his feet and paced in a circle.

"You don't know that," I pointed out as I lurched to my feet. Both my legs were asleep and were more than a little irritated at having to do something. "They could have ambushed you just as easily outside the cave if you'd passed by it and snuck up behind you."

Stumble stopped and looked at me, a tilted grin on his face. "Yeah, you're right, teddy bear. I guess I'd never thought about that before. Maybe you're right. Maybe it wasn't all my fault what happened." Even my muddled mind threw red flags up all over the place when Stumble said that. His pacing had turned him away from me and facing the woods, through which lay the Southern Beach and the place where Midnight Walks took place. I leapt because I knew if he started running, there was no chance I'd ever be able to gallop fast enough to catch him. He'd started to move the same time I jumped and I managed to grab the tail of his raccoon pelt as I fell flat on my face. If life were fair then the fact I was so big and Stumble was so not big would mean that he wouldn't have been able to budge me. Life isn't fair. I don't know if it was the leaves, the snow, or if it was his determination, but he didn't have any trouble moving me at all and managed to get to a run even with me stretched out behind him holding his pelt tail. I got a face-full of tree trunk at one point before I bounced off but managed to keep hold as Stumble kept running. He finally ran between two trees that were close enough together that I got stuck between them, causing him to fall down when I stopped moving. I laughed hysterically as I thought about Winnie-the-Pooh and Rabbit's Hole and wondered if such a thing were possible between tree trunks.

"Let me go," Stumble was screaming at the top of his voice. "Let me go, or I'll kill you." He started kicking at me with his feet.

"I can't because I know what you're going to do and I'm a coward and can't let you," I said screaming back just as loudly while keeping a death-grip on the raccoon tail even though it meant my face and head were being struck once again. I was beginning to wonder if I'd have any freckles left on my face by the time we were finished.

"So who cares if you're a coward? What's that got to do with anything? Just let me go. No one will ever know and I won't have to remember it all the time." I wondered if the large thing I'd seen in the woods would be scared or attracted by the screaming we were doing.

"I will," I said in a loud but not screaming voice. "If you take a Midnight Walk, I'll be right behind you because there's no way I'd be able to handle it because I am a coward. You said so yourself." Mercifully the kicking stopped. "If you do that I'll _know_ it was my fault you did. It wasn't your fault what happened to Slider, it was the pirates who did it. They were the ones who attacked you and Slider. You can't blame yourself for that. But if you go on to the next adventure before you're supposed to, then I'm the only one to blame and…" I didn't say anything, but just kept holding on to his pelt tail in case he tried to rabbit again.

"But that's stupid. It's not your fault." There was heavy confusion in his voice as if he couldn't understand how I'd managed to come up with such an idea. "It's not your fault," he repeated in a quieter voice. Then, "I know what you're trying to do."

"No you don't. You just think you do, but if you go I swear to everything on this island that I'll Walk within a night." At my words, there was the faintest sound of jingling on a wind that appeared out of nowhere, the sign that magic was occurring. It was the Lost Boy equivalent of spitting in our palms and shaking on some deal. It convinced Stumble, and even me, that I meant what I'd said. It started slow and faint, but in a couple of minutes there were great, ripping, sobs coming from Stumble as he cried for the loss of his friend. I groaned as I managed to go from laying to sitting. The large creature I'd seen in the woods turned out to be a wolf with Roo on its back. Roo dismounted and I watched as the wolf padded over to where Stumble continued to sob and started to lick his face. Stumble grabbed the wolf in a bear hug.

"Not bad," Roo decided in his typical sardonic manner. He examined my face. "You're not supposed to get beat up this way, though. Good thing you were already ugly."

It hurt when I laughed; not original, but true. "Is he going to be alright?" The sobs had quieted down a little.

Roo's look was exasperated. "How should I know? You got him to cry, though, and he hadn't done that yet. That's a good thing. I suppose." I didn't have an answer to that, so I simply sat while Roo stood with folded arms and watched Stumble slowly recover. Eventually Stumble stood up and walked over to where I was sitting. He looked at Roo and shook his head. "What's wrong Mouse-Boy? Figure the teddy bear wasn't up to the job or something?" Roo rolled his eyes, but grinned. Stumble held out his hand to help me up. "Maybe you're not as craven as you think you are," he said as he hauled me up. For Stumble that was an apology of note and I couldn't help but grin either.


	18. Chapter 18: Flying Bees

The snow and ice vanished as the summer returned, Stumble settled down a little, and I got stuck on latrine duty for three weeks running. A new record, I was told. The odd pelt I'd found on Hook's ship was still gnawing at my mind, and I continued to feel a pull to solve whose it had been and how it had ended up on _The Jolly Roger_. Still, life on the Island continued and the pirates started to push harder to find our hideout and capture Peter. Naturally there were some interesting ideas that were put forward to let the pirates know we didn't appreciate their attention.

"Why me?" I asked plaintively. I didn't mind doing a lot of the more interesting and weird things asked of me, but there were times that even my limited amount of common sense managed to kick in.

"Because you're a bear and bears like bees," Tig patiently explained as he adjusted the vines tied to a sapling.

"You mean they like honey and in some cases a lot more honey than they should have liked," Stumble said as he held the sapling bent over while Tig did the tying and stared at my middle.

"I'm not a bear, I'm a Lost Boy and I don't like bees or honey. Ursa's in a bear pelt too, why doesn't he get to do this?"

"Cuz he's helping Leo and Surefoot lead the pirates this way."

"I'da helped. I almost begged to help."

"He can run faster than you can, though."

"Who can't?" Stumble snorted as he gently released the sapling. The vines held and both he and Tigger breathed a sigh of relief. I glared at Stumble even though I couldn't argue with him about my galloping speed.

"Look, it'll be easy. All you gotta do is wait 'til Stumble gives you the word and you cut the vines holding the tree. The tree'll catapult the beehive and it'll smash into the pirates and they'll go back to The Jolly Roger for awhile."

That was something we were all hoping for. The pirates had been particularly tenacious at finding us this time, something that may have had to do with the fact that Peter had once again managed to relieve Hook of his treasure and, this time, two cannons. They hadn't been as heavy as I thought they'd be and Ursa and I had managed to get them overboard without too much trouble once they weren't tied down. The splash had alerted at least one of the pirates, but by the time they could get anything together, we were already rowing towards the Island in one of their rowboats. Since the two cannons were from the side facing the Island, they weren't able to do anything about it except make some really vile threats.

"I notice there ain't no beehive in that tree," I pointed out.

"Um, yeah, there is that," Tig hedged. "But beehives are normally in trees and you're the best one of us at climbing them."

"Don't forget he's the best at falling out of them too." He pointed to a large depression under a nearby tree. "Bet you climbed that tree once upon a time."

"Bet I didn't."

"Anyway, I know where there's a tree with a perfect beehive in it and it's not too high. It'll be perfect."

I looked at Stumble who looked back at me grinning. "Stumble's right, you know. I do occasionally fall out of trees…"

"Occasionally?" the two said together, sounding more like Tig and Leo than Tig and Stumble.

"Fine, frequently. But you notice when I fall out of trees I'm not normally carrying stuff when I do it…"

"How about that telescope?" Tig asked.

"And that dragon egg?"

"How about that bottle with the note in it?"

"Yeah, what were you doing climbing a tree with that?"

"It was in my pocket," I told Stumble, rather defensively, "and I forgot I had it. Besides, what I meant to say was that I don't normally climb trees with stuff that can hurt me."

"Not when it came to the dragon egg," Tig reminded me. "That dragon was pretty upset when you fell out of the tree with it. It's a good thing she wasn't a fire-breather."

"Oh yeah, getting covered in ice was sooooooo much better and she was only upset until she found out the egg didn't break."

"You were lucky it landed on your stomach, Teddy Bear. If you'd landed on it, we'd have had scrambled egg for a month."

"Not the way you cook," I mumbled, too softly for him to hear me, although he could tell I'd said something he probably wouldn't have been too happy about.

"It'll be okay," Tig said, interrupting whatever reply Stumble had been getting ready to make. "We'll just make sure you're super careful when you get the beehive and nothing will happen."

"Swear?" I asked.

"Course not. I'm not dumb."

I thought about it. It wasn't that I was scared about falling out of the tree of course, it was the company I'd have coming with me if I did. They probably wouldn't be at all happy about it and I'd be the nearest thing to take that unhappiness out on. Still, it would be one of the best surprises for the pirates I'd ever been involved in, even better than sinking two of their cannons. "Let's see this beehive," I said with a sigh.

Tig grinned figuring I was hooked. He led both of us a little way into the woods before stopping in front of a large tree. It was actually a pretty good climbing tree with one exception and the beehive wasn't that far up although I think my definition of 'high' and Tig's probably differed. "There's no branches for like eight feet up and there aren't any trees close enough to climb and then slide over to that one."

"What about that one?" Tig asked, pointing to the closest tree to the beehive one. It had plenty of branches close to the ground but the trunk was about as thick as my arm and it looked as though it had been dead for a few years.

"Seriously?"

"We don't have time to find another beehive. Stumble and me will give you a boost to the upper branches."

"You and who?" Stumble demanded. "No way, Stripe Boy. I'm not even sure we could get him off the ground."

"That's why I got this," Tigger said, pulling out a small bottle. Before either of us could say anything, he pulled the cork out and dumped it all over me. There wasn't enough pixie dust to get me airborne, but I felt a little bit lighter. I think. It was hard to tell.

"I'm not going to do it," Stumble continued to insist.

"If ya do, I'll tell you where I found some crystals that no one else knows about."

"Hey, that's not fair," he said at the same time I asked, "What about me? You didn't offer anything to me for this."

He ignored me and told Stumble that he could always climb the tree if he didn't want to help me get up it. "Yeah, I could boost him up there easy. No problem," I confirmed eagerly. It was probably a bit too eager.

Stumble gave me a suspicious look and muttered that he'd help but that he'd better get those crystals for all this work. Tig and Stumble stood next to each other and I proceeded to attempt, with their help, to climb up on their shoulders. There were several false starts, with Stumble collapsing twice (but I was pretty sure they were fake collapses), before I managed to get my hands around the lowest branch. Once I was off their shoulders Stumble moved quickly away from under me with a comment or two about falling things. I pulled myself onto the branch with a great deal of effort and sat there panting for a few moments. "The pirates will be in position soon," Tig called up to remind me.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," I said to myself as I started up the tree. As beehives went, this one was pretty big and there were a lot of bees buzzing around it. I looked at it trying to figure out what the best way to do this was going to be. There was another reminder from below about how little time remained. Figuring I was just putting things off, I managed to get the hive loose from the branch it'd been attached to. The bees were a little concerned, but not yet alarmed by what was going on. I gingerly tucked the hive under my arm and started carefully back down, leaving a trail of flying bees behind me.

I got to the final branch of the tree and looked down at Tig. "Now what?" I asked.

"Oh. I didn't even think about that. Maybe you can get down the same way you got up. C'mere, Stumble."

"It's not going to happen. I bet all his pixie dust has worn off."

"It wasn't pixie dust to begin with, I sprinkled him with salt. Anyway, he's coming down, he's not going up so it won't be as big a deal." I wondered if that was supposed to be a pun, but held my tongue since I was preoccupied with the bees that seemed to be a bit more upset about things. For the next several minutes Tig and Stumble fought about how I was going to get down.

"Hey, guys? Guys? Uh…" I tried to let them know that they needed to decide really quickly but before I'd attracted their attention, it was attracted by the sound of the branch I was on breaking. I fell the eight or so feet to the ground and fell on my back. I managed to keep hold of the hive somehow and kept if from jarring too much. I got stung on the end of my nose and a finger, but that wasn't too big a price to pay as to what it could have been.

"It wasn't pixie dust to begin with, I sprinkled him with salt. Anyway, he's coming down, not climbing, so it won't be as big a deal." I wondered if that was supposed to be a pun, but held my tongue since I was preoccupied with bees that seemed to be a bit more upset about things. For the next sever minutes I perched on the lowest branch while Tig and Stumble fought about how I was going to get down and who was going to help.

"Guys? Hey, guys? Uh…" I tried to let them know that they needed to decide really quickly, but before I'd attracted their attention, everyone's attention was attracted by the sound of a sharp crack as the branch I was on bid goodbye to the tree. I fell the eight feet or so to the ground and landed on my back. As usual, it knocked the breath out of me, but somehow I managed to keep hold of the beehive without jarring it too much. I got stung on a finger and the end of my nose, but it wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. Once I stopped wheezing, I breathed a sigh of relief. "Can we not do that again?"

"Is that like the 'Let's Not Hit Cubby on the Head Game'? Tig wanted to know.

"Yeah, but it don't have any rules that you can change. It just means no more beehives. Period."

"It sounds awfully complicated," Stumble advised. "I'm not sure you could handle it. We better think about doing that later when we have more time."

I didn't know why it would be considered complicated, although I had my suspicions. I slowly got back to my feet, which wasn't easy when you considered I still had hands full of hive. Once I was standing, Tig led me and Stumble back towards the sapling. I noticed neither one of them got too close to me, nor did they follow me since I was leaving a trail of bees behind me.

"Ya know, I'm not too sure about this," I said as I carefully placed the hive on the trunk to Tig's specifications.

"How come, Furball?"

"We did this with wasps and it didn't work real well."

"Course not, Teddy Bear. That's because you're a bee boy, not a wasp boy."

I looked at Stumble. "That doesn't even pretend to make sense.'

He gave his high pitched laugh that sounded the way a chipmunk laugh probably did. "It does if you don't worry at it too much. Besides if it doesn't work, what could go wrong."

"We could get swarmed by bees?"

"Not me, I'm going to go signal you when the pirates are in position. Listen for the owl's hoot. By the way, your nose looks like a strawberry." Before I could respond, he took off.

I looked at Tig. "Owl's hoot?"

"Be happy. He had thought about trying a hummingbird whistle."

"I…"

"Don't even ask, I have got no clue." Tig whistled tunelessly while we waited for Stumble's signal. It actually wasn't too bad a day and the bees' humming began to lull me towards the land of dreams. My eyes opened wide as I noticed him start playing with a wicked looking hatchet.

"What's that for?"

"It's so you can cut the vines holding the tree. You didn't think you could use your club, did you?"

I hadn't really given it that much thought, but could see his point. Still… "Maybe it'd be better if you did this?" I asked hopefully.

He shook his head. "No way, Furball. This is going to need all the luck we got available and you have a ton more than I do. Not that we're depending on it." I nodded in agreement. Luck was something you absolutely never depended on, although it was very cool when it decided to show up. He handed me the hatched, handle first. There was dark reddish-brown stains on the blade.

"Is that blood?"

He glanced at it. "Naw, strawberry juice. Surefoot was using it to cut strawberries in two." I was pretty sure that strawberry juice wasn't quite that dark, even dried, but stopped worrying about it. From far away there was the sound of a horn calling. "Way to sneak up on someone, Leo," Tig said with a roll of his eyes. Right after that there was the sound of someone yelling 'Who'.

"You've got to be kidding," I said as I took a swing at the vine with the hatchet. It cut cleanly through the vine, part of the trunk the vine was attached to, the leg of my pelt and my leg itself. Fortunately it wasn't deep and I'd learned awhile back to carry enough stuff to bandage wounds with that it wasn't a big deal at all. The tree swung back upright and the beehive took off in a great arc for parts unknown. Unfortunately a few bees had stayed behind and they took exception to their hive being flung to parts unknown. I added two more stings to my nose, three on my hand and, don't ask me how, one on my tongue. Tig looked concerned but that didn't stop him from having to muffle his laughter by biting on his hand. I also noticed the bees didn't seem to have paid him any attention at all.

"Bee killer," he said with a smirk. "Every one of those that stung you is going to be dead now. Before I could come up with something appropriately witty and sarcastic to respond with, there was a great roar from the direction of where the beehive had been flung to. Tig and I looked at each other, our expressions of puzzlement mirroring each other. "What the heck was that?"

That came crashing out of the trees at the far end of the meadow and stood glaring at us a moment before letting out another roar that could have been 'hey' and galloping towards us. "Run," I yelled as the centaur wearing a pirate hat made it a quarter of the way across the meadow. Tig didn't take any prompting at all and followed me through the woods, dodging trees and bushes and leaping over downed logs. For several yards Tig and I were actually neck-in-neck which says how scared I was. "I thought centaurs didn't exist," I managed to choke out. I don't know why I thought the existence of a centaur on an island where dragons, elves, dwarves and trolls wandered was strange, but it seemed the best question to ask at the time. Behind us, the sounds of crashing didn't seem any closer but weren't any further away either. I wasn't going to take the time to turn and check after seeing the expression on its face.

"Does it really matter whether it exists or not when it's chasing us, Fleabag?" His breathing sounded almost as ragged as mine and he did have a point. I could tell it rattled him as much as me since that's when 'Furball' became 'Fleabag'.

I was doing pretty well until I managed to trip over my own paws on a stretch of ground that only had leaves on it and was perfectly level. I sprawled in dramatic fashion, yelping as my stung nose hit the dirt, and managed to plow up quite a quantity of leaves, dirt, and one massively irritated frog. When a frog sticks its tongue out at you, you know you've had a tongue stuck out at you. It took Tig a few moments to realize I wasn't right behind him any longer even with the amount of noise I'd made nose-diving into the dirt. Before he reached me, I felt myself lifted up by the scruff of my bear pelt and was staring into the outraged face of the centaur. A face that looked as though it had been stung several times over. "Is this your mischief?" he roared, displaying the bee hive in the other hand, looking a bit worse for wear and still swarming with bees somehow.

There was absolutely no way I was going to answer that one truthfully unless threatened with loss of blueberries and appendages. "Gruuuhhhghh," I answered as the pelt started choking me.

"You better leave him alone," Tig demanded while at the same time hurling a rock at the beehive the centaur was holding. It hit dead on and there was an outpouring of more bees than one thought a hive of that size would be capable of holding. The centaur flung me away, but kept hold of the beehive for reasons which escaped me but which I wasn't going to complain about. For what may be the first time in history, I hit the ground on my paws and took off again, following Tig.

I was weary enough and been scared of the centaur for so long that my gallop wasn't nearly enough to keep up with Tigger's fastest running speed. He kept his pace slow enough that I was able to keep up with him, sort of. Since the portion of the woods we were going through was overgrown, even my fastest speed was faster than the centaur's was since he was a lot bigger than me. It wasn't until we got near the Little Bear River that I had my first dry heave from galloping so long, another record. Tig led us towards a huge, hollow log that we'd spanned the river with a few months ago. The river bank was a few feet above the river at this point and it provided a perfect bridge. "To the other side. Hurry," Tig gasped out. He dived into the log and started across with me close behind. There was a frustrated roar from behind us as I dived into the log. I started across and suddenly got wedged.

It had been a couple of months and several thousand blueberries since I'd been through the log. Time apparently does make a difference. I clawed at the bark in front of me with my hands and was kicking at the dirt behind me with my paws, but there was no way I was getting the rest of me into the log. I didn't have a chance to panic about potentially being stuck half-in and half-out of a hollow log because I was too busy panicking about the fact that one of my legs had been grabbed and used to yank me out of the log.

I dangled upside-down by one foot looking at the centaur that was still holding the stupid beehive. He casually swung a hoof and knocked a log that had taken six of us to wrestle into place into the river below. I swung my head around to see Tig had escaped the log ahead of its dunking and was standing on the far bank yelling stuff. "You shouldn't have done that," I ventured quietly to the centaur. It wasn't as though I could get into any more trouble than I was already in.

"Or what? You're going to toss a beehive at me? That's something that's never happened before." I'm pretty sure I got red at the words, but was too busy trying to wipe off the vast amount of spit that had suddenly landed on my face from his talking. He shook me hard enough that my teeth rattled.

"We weren't aiming at you," I tried to explain in the lamest excuse ever used for lobbing a beehive at somebody. "I guess Stu… our lookout saw the pirate hat and thought you were a pirate."

"A pirate?" he roared, spraying my face once more. He may not have been a pirate but he had ocean surf down to a science. "Do I look like a pirate?"

I twisted my head around to see what Tig was doing and this time it was the back of my pelt hood that got sprayed. Tig was nowhere in sight and I wondered what deviousness he was up to. The good thing about being a Lost Boy was that someone always had your back even when you were snatched up by something that wasn't supposed to exist. I turned to face the centaur again, my nose starting to run from being held upside down. "Uh, the hat?"

"Hat? What in Edgar's Shadow are you talking about?" I pointed at the pirate hat he was wearing. It was pretty clichéd, black with a skull and crossbones sloppily painted or chalked on it. He started to move his hand with the beehive towards where I was pointing, then thought better of it. "Oh, the hat. What about it?" I was getting good at closing my eyes before the spray hit me, but my face was getting soaked.

"It made us think you were a pirate and that caused us to launch the hive at you. It was an accident."

"Do you know what I do to those that pelt me with beehives?" This was said in a voice that would make thunder envious.

I shook my head which was a bad idea since I immediately became dizzy. "Naw-uh. You said that it had never happened before," I pointed out helpfully. Part of my mind was beginning to wonder if I had some sort of death wish thing going on.

He bounced the beehive in a giant hand which didn't do anything to settle them down. I felt a sudden pain on the bottom of my paw and figured one of the bees had found one of the holes in the sole of my pawmoc.

"Hey, you. Yeah, you, Nagboy. You better put that teddy bear down or I'm going to make you writhe in the agonies of horrible disaster that will have people singing about for ages." The centaur looked at me and I shrugged. It's a lot harder to shrug upside down than you'd think and probably doesn't have nearly the same effect. He looked back in the direction I was facing, something he didn't seem to have a lot of problem doing when you're human torso is connected to one of a horse, and we both saw Stumble standing there with a slingshot aimed at us. The centaur quickly whirled around so he was facing Stumble and lowered me so that my head was now at the level of the centaur's front hocks. I felt like hurling but wasn't sure that was practical upside-down.

"You are telling me what to do?" I wondered if he ever talked at a 'normal' level or if this was normal for a centaur. My ears were beginning to ring and even though the view wasn't real hot, it was good to be away from the sound and spray.

"Yeah, I'm telling you what to do you nag. So you better do it."

The centaur lifted me up to his level again and I squinted to prepare for incoming spit. "What's a nag?"

"Uh, a horse." I decided it wasn't in my best interests to mention that it was both a female horse and one that wasn't quite a prime specimen.

"A horse?" My head hit the ground before it was jerked back up to hock level again. "I'll show you a horse. Do your worst pup."

"He's not a wolf, he's a raccoon," I told the ground before yelping in pain once again. This time it was my rump that had been stung, but it wasn't by any bee. "Watch it," I yelled to Stumble.

"Quiet, Teddy Bear. You're ruining my concentration. If you think it's so easy, why don't you try doing this?"

"I'd love to," I muttered to the dirt below me as I felt another pain bloom on my leg."

"Sorry," Stumble called out sarcastically.

"Best you can do? I think I will leave now," the centaur said before giving a yell which made the other conversation he'd made sound like whispering. Right after that I saw stars as my head hit the ground again, before I fell over.

"Run, Cubby," Stumble shouted. I almost froze at hearing him call me by name, maybe the first time that had ever happened, before staggering to knees and then feet and galloping forward. At least I tried to. It was more of a thirty-degree angle to straight and it didn't help matters any that the centaur was swinging his hand that Stumble's rock had apparently hit and clouted me upside the head with it. I bounced off a pine tree, over some blackberry thorns and into a thistle patch before making it to where Stumble was making a tactical retreat.

"I knew you liked me," I said goofily. I wasn't tracking real well but him calling me by name is something I'd never forget.

"Dragonbait, if you ever tell anyone that, I'm gonna deny it 'til the cows make a reappearance." he said as he shot off another missile which was followed by more bellowing. "We gotta get out of here and I ain't carrying you so you better get ready to move." About that time Tigger showed up. He was soaked, so he'd apparently re-crossed the river in a more conventional manner.

"You escaped. Good!"

"He didn't escape, ol' Hands-and-Hooves threw him away and the Teddy Bear started following me home."

"Centaurs don't exist,' Tig said as we started moving slowly away. He joined Stumble's missile barrage which kept the centaur at bay but didn't keep him from shouting all sorts of interesting ways in which he was going to 'take care of us'. I didn't care. My nose felt as if it were the size of a grapefruit and I ached all over. Plus, every step I took caused the bottom of my left foot to hurt where the bee had stung me. I searched through my pelt pockets trying to find my own slingshot.

"I told ya this wasn't a good idea," Stumble growled at me, letting another rock fly.

"Me?"

"Relax guys, we got bigger problems," Tig advised.


End file.
